Karen has worked in both the private and public sectors specializing in soils, hydrology, geomorphology, ecology, and watershed management. She has designed and implemented many watershed restoration projects for the US Forest Service. She worked in Central America on disaster recovery, Morocco on flood and erosion mitigation, and in Russia on salmon habitat restoration. Her work with small island nations in the Pacific focused on ridge-to-reef restoration including protection and restoration of mangrove forests. She has consulted in Vietnam, India, and Brazil on ecosystem services relating to hydropower and water supply company payments to upland farmers and developing the forestry component for Vietnam’s Green Growth Strategy. She worked with USAID and the Government of Nepal to assess the condition of natural resources as a baseline for a $25 million USAID project (PAANI). She organized and was the lead scientist on an expedition of the Karnali River in western Nepal to develop an integrated management framework and strategies for river conservation to protect aquatic biodiversity from hydropower development.

She is currently a consultant to the US Forest Service International Program office as the lead author and science advisor for development of the “Nature-based Solutions for Disaster and Climate Resilient Infrastructure chapter for the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure’s flagship report.