Pam Jagger

Pam Jagger is a Professor in the School for Environment and Sustainability at the University of Michigan, and holds a Research Associate Professor position at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She directs the NSF-funded Energy Poverty PIRE in Southern Africa (EPPSA) and leads the interdisciplinary Forest Use, Energy, and Livelihoods (FUEL) Lab. Her research focuses on energy poverty, environmental governance, and rural livelihoods in low-income countries. Key areas include quantifying forest contributions to household income, analyzing environmental policy impacts, and evaluating interventions to improve access to clean energy.

Dr. Jagger’s work bridges applied political economy and environmental science, with collaborations spanning epidemiology, engineering, and policy analysis. Her FUEL Lab’s three core themes—environment and livelihoods, environmental governance, and energy poverty—address interlinked challenges of sustainability and equity. Notable projects include assessing household air pollution exposure in Malawi and Rwanda, analyzing China’s reforestation policies, and evaluating decentralized solar grids in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Her career includes policy research roles at the World Bank and CIFOR. Advising and grants include leadership of multi-institutional initiatives like EPPSA, which trains researchers and supports energy access studies in Southern Africa. She is affiliated with the Carolina Population Center and contributes to global networks like the Clean Cooking Implementation Science Network.

Labs/Teams: The FUEL Lab combines economics, institutional analysis, and environmental science to study natural resource reliance and human well-being in developing nations. Current projects emphasize systems science approaches for interventions targeting household air pollution and energy transitions.