Xi graduated with a MS from the environmental studies program at University of Colorado, Boulder. Xi is interested in understanding the role of policy in facilitating large-scale transitions to renewables. Most recently, she has been examining how the most popular renewable policy in the United States today -- the renewable portfolio standard (RPS) -- emerged in California not as a predetermined outcome, but as a result of contingencies. Xi has also been working with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) on renewables curtailment research. Prior to graduate school, Xi worked as a strategy and technology consultant at Booz Allen Hamilton in Washington, DC. While there, she also engaged in social, food, and environmental justice activism. She has also worked on organic and subsistence farms in Washington, DC, Spain, and Ecuador. Xi earned a BA in English literature from Cornell University.