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Climate change expert to give March 22 Teale lecture
- March 12, 2007
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| Climate, climate change, and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change will be the topic of a lecture by Richard Somerville on Thursday, March 22, at 4 p.m. in Konover Auditorium. His talk is part of the Edwin Way Teale Lecture Series on Nature & the Environment. The event is open to the public and admission is free. Somerville is a Distinguished Professor at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego. He received a Ph.D. in meteorology from New York University, and has been a professor at Scripps since 1979. His research focuses on the physics of the climate system. Using diverse observations, ranging from satellite images of storms to detailed measurements of microscopic cloud particles, Somerville compares computer simulations with reality. His work has led to many innovations in climate models, and he is regarded as an authority on the prospects for climate change in coming decades. Somerville comments frequently on climate and environmental issues for the media and has also testified before the United States Congress, briefed United Nations climate change negotiators, advised government agencies on research, education, and outreach, and trained schoolteachers.
He is a Fellow of both the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Meteorological Society, and has received awards from the American Meteorological Society for both his research and his popular book, The Forgiving Air: Understanding Environmental Change. He is a coordinating lead author for the most recent major climate science assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), to be released in May. The IPCC has become the de facto voice of the mainstream scientific community, as people around the world seek to understand the findings of climate science and their relevance to public policy. It has been highly influential in the debate over anthropogenic (caused by humans) climate change. Somerville’s lecture will include an overview of the organization. He will also discuss the role of the IPCC in influencing climate research as well as assessing it; the nature of scientific consensus and dissent in areas of active research with strong policy implications; and the outlook for the future of the IPCC; as well as summarizing the main findings of the IPCC report due out in May. |
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