Dr. Yu Cao

Dr. Yu Cao

Phone: (805) 756-
Office: 180-
Email: ycao12@calpoly.edu

 

Office Hours Listings

 

 

 

Dr. Cao's Areas of Focus

Environmental Policy · Energy Justice and Security · Corporate Social Responsibility · Arctic Policy

About Dr. Yu Cao

Cao applies both quantitative and qualitative methods in her research, which focuses on developing and applying tools for community-driven energy planning in Alaska, with the goal of enhancing energy sovereignty and resilience in rural and Indigenous communities. She engages with three Alaska communities, Galena, Kotzebue, and Nome, where she conducted in-depth interviews, focus groups and scenario workshops. Her work bridges social science, resource governance, and sustainable energy transitions, integrating community engagement and policy analysis to advance equitable energy solutions.

Cao is currently a Senior Fellow at The Arctic Institute, Center for Circumpolar Security Studies. She is a contributing writer to the Institute’s weekly publication in app form, The Arctic This Week App. Cao was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF) Alaska Center for Energy and Power (ACEP). She was also an Instructor at the Department of Business Administration at the University of the People. She holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from Northern Arizona University, an M.A. in Arctic and Northern studies with a focus on Environmental Policy from UAF, and an M.A in Economics from Kent State University.

Selected Publications

Cao, Yu. 2025. Implications of Chinese overseas mining operations for community-level social conflict. The Extractive Industries and Society, 22, 101619. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.exis.2025.101619.

Cao, Yu. 2022. “Implications for Sino-Russian Cooperation on the Polar Silk Road.” In Heininen, L., Exner-Pirot and J. Barnes (eds.), Arctic Yearbook 2022: The Russian Arctic: Economics, Politics and Peoples. Akureyri, Iceland: Arctic Portal.

Parlato, Nicholas, Kiyaseh, Christopher, Filimonova, Nadezhda, Ziebarth, Daniel and Cao, Yu. 2022. “Report from the USC-NSF Arctic Security Conference.” In Heininen, L., H. Exner-Pirot and J. Barnes (eds.), Arctic Yearbook 2022: The Russian Arctic: Economics, Politics, and Peoples. Akureyri, Iceland: Arctic Portal.

Cao, Yu. 2021. “Communities’ Reflections on Oil Companies’ Corporate Social Responsibility Activities in Utgiagvik, Alaska.” In Gudmundur Alfredsson, Julia Jabour, Timo Koivurova, and Akiho Shibata, eds., The Yearbook of Polar Law, Volume 12, 396 - 414. Leiden and Boston: Brill Nijhoff. DOI: 10.1163/22116427_012010023.