Pengfei Liu

liu

Research

I am an assistant professor at the Department of Environmental and Natural Resource Economics, with a Ph.D. degree in agricultural and resource economics from the University of Connecticut in 2016. My main interests include environmental and resource economics, energy economics, agriculture economics, and experimental economics. I have published leading environmental and resource economic journals and received research funding from government agencies including USDA, EPA, and NOAA as well as private organizations such as the Sloan Foundation.

Related to the coastal issues, I am a PI on a Connecticut Sea grant project titled “Bio-economic Outcomes under Alternative Management Strategies Interacting with Human Choice and Behavior: Modeling Tautog and Anglers’ Preferences.” We use survey and experimental methods to estimate anglers’ preference for alternative fishing regulations in the Long Island Sound. Project results will be presented to the government agencies in both New York and Connecticut to make future regulatory decisions. I am also involved in research related to the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) and the increasing risks of coastal communities under climate change. Current NIFP is heavily subsidized (as well as in huge deficit) and needs reforms. My research in water quality and energy economy can be easily generalized to coastal issues.

I hope to conduct more research locally to Rhode Island, and use economic tools to provide better decision supports to integrative, sustainable coastal management. I also hope to collaborate with other researchers in the coastal institution to collectively work on projects of common interests, including: water quality, property prices in the coastal communities, economic implications of climate changes/sea level rises, flood risk and insurance, coastal related ecosystem services. I can contribute to the mission of coastal institute with my economic background and translate the ecological changes to social/economic impacts (e.g., evaluated in monetary terms) to better communicate with the public and government agencies.