Linwood Pendleton


Linwood Pendleton, a Franco-American environmental economist, is the Executive Director of the Ocean Knowledge Action Network and formerly the Senior Vice-President for . Previously, he was the World Wildlife Fund . Since October 2014, Pendleton has served as International Chair in Marine Ecosystem Services at the and . He is also a senior fellow at Duke's Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions and Adjunct Associate Professor at the Duke University Marine Laboratory, part of NIEPS. He previously served as the Director of Ocean and Coastal Policy for the Nicholas Institute and was the founder of the Marine Ecosystem Services Partnership. Pendleton was the Acting Chief Economist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration from 2011-2013.
Pendleton has collaborated with conservationists worldwide including at the WWF, The Nature Conservancy, Environmental Defense Fund, NRDC, and he served for nearly ten years on the Board of the Conservation Strategy Fund. He served on the Science Advisory Committee of the Gulf of Maine Research Institute, GEO Blue Planet steering committee, the Blue Carbon Finance Working Group, and the OBIS science advisory committee. Pendleton has served on several government and scholarly advisory boards and committees, including the California Marine Life Protection Act Initiative, as part of the statewide Science Advisory Team and Central Coast Subteam. He currently sits on the Editorial Board of the .
His interests are now on building bottom-up networks to support ocean professionals and scientists working to co-design science for sustainable development.

Education and Academic Career

Pendleton left Lafayette High School after his junior year to start an undergraduate degree at the College of William and Mary where he graduated summa cum laude and a member of the Phi Beta Kappa and Sigma Xi honor societies. In 1986 he started a Ph.D. in Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior at Princeton University where he studied the evolutionary strategies for co-existence two species of caiman in the upper Amazon Basin, in Manu National Park. In 1989 Pendleton left Princeton with a terminal masters degree. He next attended Harvard's Kennedy School of Government where he earned a masters of public administration; his studies included field work in Belize, Nicaragua, and Honduras. His work in Nicaragua led to a forestry.
Immediately after graduating from Harvard, Pendleton enrolled in a doctoral degree in Forestry and Environmental Studies from Yale University. He left Yale in 1996 to become the first faculty member hired into the University of Southern California's new Environmental Studies Program, with a primary appointment in Economics. He received his doctoral degree from Yale later that year in the spring of 1997 while finishing his first year as an assistant professor. While at USC, Pendleton transitioned to the School of International Relations and eventually left the university to become an assistant professor of Economics and Finance at the University of Wyoming. In 2004 in the Environmental Science and Engineering Program at UCLA's School of Public Health.

Interdisciplinary, Non-Academic Career

Pendleton took a one-year leave of absence from UCLA to become the senior fellow and director of economic research at in Washington, D.C., and founder and director of the in North Sandwich, New Hampshire before leaving to become the Director of Ocean and Coastal Policy at . While at Duke, Pendleton also served as the at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, through an Intergovernmental Personal Act appointment.
In 2014, Pendleton began the position of at the, in the department of . While holding the "Chair" Pendleton also has served as the global lead ocean scientist at World Wildlife Fund and later served as the Senior Vice-president for Science at the Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution Ocean.

Scholarly Contributions

Pendleton's work is focused on the field of marine and coastal economics, policy, conservation, and the blue economy. Currently, his work has been cited more than .
CLIMATE CHANGE: In 2013, . This research was later cited by the UNFCCC's SBSTA in its
WATER QUALITY: In the United States, Pendleton has studied water quality off the beaches of Southern California, looking at the “economic contributions” of beaches and the impact that water quality has on that “contribution” including the “costs associated with pollution of coastal waters and the economic benefits associated with cleaning them.” His studies have included an investigation of the costs of health care and time missed from work by beachgoers due to illness related to low water quality at several South California beaches. This study was used as evidence in the Environmental Protection Agencies decision to institute the first fineable total maximum daily load regulation for beach water quality. Pendleton also filed an Amicus Curiae brief to the
MARINE PROTECTION: In 2002, Pendleton published a report titled “A Preliminary Study of the Value of Coastal Tourism in Rincon, Puerto Rico” assessing the percentage of Rincon's income that has coastal tourism as its source. Pendleton stated that "should the quality of the coastal and ocean resources of the area become impaired, it is likely that a large portion of Rincon's economy will be lost" and estimated the annual income generated by tourism related to coastal and ocean resources to be greater than $51.9 million. The information from this 2002 report has been cited as instrumental to the designation of the Tres Palmas Marine Reserve as a marine protected area, resulting in the protection of “one of the last remaining elkhorn coral reefs in the Caribbean” and the continued status of Rincon as a “surfing epicenter”.
Also in Southern California, Pendleton's research on behalf of the Santa Monica Bay Restoration Foundation played a role in implementing the Marine Life Protection Act, creating marine reserves off Westward Beach, Point Dume and Paradise Cove. Pendleton's study surveyed California residents about their visits to the coast and determined that “more than 90 percent of visits to the Southern California coast are for ‘non-consumptive’ activities such as scuba diving, tide-pooling and surfing, and that such ‘non-take’ activities bring more money to coastal economies than ‘consumptive activities’ like fishing.” Data collected related to the impact visits to the coast have on coastal economies showed that consumptive visits brought $2.5 million to these economies while non-consumptive visits were the source of an almost $115 million.
MARINE ECOSYSTEM SERVICES: During his time at The Ocean Foundation’s Coastal Ocean Values Center in 2008, Pendleton coauthored and edited the published report “The Economic and Market Value of Coasts and Estuaries: What’s At Stake?” which presented the findings of a study assessing “the economic value of the nation’s coastal areas in excess of hundreds of billions of dollars”. The study also found that although estuaries and coasts cover a small percentage of the total land area of United States they are home to 43% of the United States’ population and produce 49% of its economic output. In discussion of the findings of the study, Pendleton said “We are only now coming to grips with the enormity of the economic value and potential from sustainable uses of our coastal resources, and more importantly, the potential economic losses we suffer each year because of underinvestment in coastal protection and restoration.”
INTRACOASTAL WATERWAY: In 2010, Pendleton's work focused on rethinking the operation, maintenance, and management funding of the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway. As part of this work he undertook an expedition aboard his personal vessel, Indicator, travelling up the waterway from the Duke Marine Lab in Beaufort, NC to the Chesapeake Bay in July 2010. At the end of the expedition, Pendleton convened a policy lab in Washington, DC to bring together stakeholders interested in the Waterway's future such as governmental agency officials, commercial and recreational waterway users, environmental scientists and economists. The policy lab was convened at the request of Congressman Mike McIntyre and was planned as the first of a series of three meetings to discuss the Waterway. Pendleton's purpose in planning an expedition prior to the policy lab was to gain a “sea level perspective” of the challenges the waterway faced. He stated: “I don’t think you can speak credibly about managing the waterway without spending time on it. When you’re at the helm, it’s a completely different story.”
RESEARCH AT THE LABEX MER: As the LabexMer International Chair in Marine Ecosystem Services, Pendleton gathered a research team to develop the use of ecosystem services' theoretical framework and data to improve the management of coastal and marine areas. This includes the following projects:

Recent Keynote Addresses

' – the opening Keynote for the World Congress on Marine Biodiversity given as a 3-act play with poet Anna Zivian and concert pianist Robert Hodge as active collaborators.
' – A collaboration with artist Adam Martinakis and poet Anna Zivian, given to the European Marine Board’s Ocean Big Data Forum.
– Developed and moderatored the Ocean Data technical session for this collaborative, bi-national conference hosted by the French Embassy of Norway and the Franco-Norwegian Chamber of Commerce.

Media

Pendleton comments frequently in newspapers and online media, some are referenced below.
He has also appeared on TV shows such as The History Channel's Modern Marvels as an aquaculture consultant and CBS News as a public health expert.

Literature

Pendleton is the editor or co-author of 2 books and several peer-reviewed scientific papers, several of which are referenced below.
Books:
'''Selected marine and coastal articles:'''