Dr Cristina IZAGUIRRE
Coastal Analyst
Geosciences, Energy and Maritime
Marine and Coastal Engineering
Physical Oceanography
My research activities are focused on coastal impact
modelling and risk assessment to understand and evaluate implications of
climate change and sea-level rise on Pacific countries. I work on defining methodologies
for climate change risk assessment at different spatial scales and approaches
to obtain coastal impact indicators.
The coastal impacts in which I am focused on are, mainly,
coral bleaching, coastal submergence of low-lying areas, extreme flooding
events and coastal erosion. The multi-hazard nature of these impacts requires time-series
of historical and projected climate hazards to characterize historical and future
impacts under climate change scenarios. Processing and using accurate exposure
data and vulnerability information to complete risk assessment is also part of
my research activities.
South Pacific Ocean
role as a coastal analyst involves scientific and technical leadership, which I
carry out thanks to my analytical and organizational skills and my orientation
towards task and objectives. In addition, over time I have strengthened my
teamwork skills by promoting collaboration and cooperation and mentoring junior
researchers. My research career in different areas of coastal engineering and
challenges addressed have made me developed a flexible mindset to deal with different
problems by being self-motivated.
I have a research career of around 15 years in climate change impacts and risk on the coast. I have been working on the effects of climate change on different sectors of the coast, such ports and other critical infrastructures, coastal communities, or maritime boundaries. Over time, my work has moved from a full technical point of view to a more scientific and technical leading managing team works, always dealing with ocean and atmospheric data from different nature, sources and reliability. This has required me try to keep up with the state of the art of the data and recognize courses on data management.