Richard is employed by the Integration and Application Network, University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science and works in the Chesapeake Bay Program Office. He is a member of the modeling team and charged with estuarine model operation and criteria assessment. He has conducted extensive model simulations, including a wide range of management scenarios, progress scenarios, climate change, Conowingo infill, long-term simulation to assess model sensitivity to nutrient loading, and over 500 geographically isolated runs to compute nutrient reduction efficiency. He has developed and refined the tidal wetland, the benthic algae, oyster and shoreline erosion models in both the CH3D and SCHISM model platforms. He has implemented both model systems on the Amazon Cloud and the EPA supercomputer and conducted simulations in the main stem Bay and tributaries like the Patuxent, Choptank and Corsica rivers. He has refined, managed and operated a suite of criteria assessment software and conducted routinely assessment on observation data and modeled scenarios. He has developed and managed a large database of both observation and modeling and provided data services to the states, governmental entities, research institutions, NGOs and stakeholders.

Before joining UMCES @ CBP, Richard was at the University of Massachusetts (2005-2012) and Harvard University (2002-2005) where he designed and coded the Generalized Water Quality Model (GWQM), which spans from nutrient dynamics through phytoplankton, zooplankton to fish trophic levels. He has successfully coupled GWQM with the Harvard Ocean Prediction System (a ROMS-type model), FVCOM and ECOM and applied the coupled systems to various coastal and estuarine systems. Meanwhile, he designed and coded a sea scallop population dynamics model and applied the model to the Gulf of Maine, Georges Bank and the Mid Atlantic Bight.