Meet the Team

Dr. Robert Newell was previously an Associate Director of the Food and Agriculture Institute at the University of the Fraser Valley, and is now a Research Associate with the Institute. He has a PhD in Geography, and is currently a Canada Research Chair in Climate Change, Biodiversity and Sustainability at Royal Roads University, where he researches and teaches courses on critical sustainability issues (particularly climate change and biodiversity loss) and approaches to sustainable community development. Newell’s research focuses on integrated planning, and he explores the use of systems thinking, models, and visualizations as tools for supporting local planning and decision-making. Much of his work has specifically looked at community climate action in an integrated planning context, and he has explored a number of different analyses and techniques for supporting local climate action efforts, such as decomposition analysis and mapping climate action co-benefits. Newell develops tools for facilitating more inclusive, collaborative approaches to planning, and his research also involves using game development software to build realistic visualizations for participatory planning and community engagement.