Newswise — The University of Maryland (UM) has more than 30 experts who can talk about different scientific, technological, economic and policy aspects of climate change critical to discussions at United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Dec. 7-18.
These experts include two conference attendees (Hultman & Hilde); scientists shaping the current international (Busalacchi) and U.S. (Justice) climate research agendas; a Nobel Prize winning economist (Schelling); a co-author of the most recent climate report released by the White House (Janetos); and the director (Arkin)of a new UM-led NOAA climate & satellites institute.
Highlighted here are comments from a few of these experts.
Nathan E. Hultman is an assistant professor in the UM School of Public Policy, and associate director of the Joint Global Change Research Institute (UM & DOE). Hultman will lead a "Side Event" (Making Better Carbon Markets) at Copenhagen. His participation in the UN climate process started in Kyoto in 1997 and has continued at subsequent meetings. He says:
"While most attention has focused on emissions targets, the Copenhagen Conference is about much more: establishing new and effective approaches to technological innovation, improving international carbon market operations, establishing sound mechanisms for developing countries to make concrete commitments on low-carbon energy infrastructure, setting new procedures for reducing deforestation, and initiating new funding for helping the poorest countries adapt to likely climate changes.
"A complete and final agreement is perhaps unlikely at Copenhagen, but substantial resolution of multiple climate policy goals is more likely now than at any other time in the past 12 years.---------------------------------------------------Antonio Busalacchi is a UM professor of Atmospheric and Oceanic Science, and director of the university's Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center. Busalacchi leads the international research agenda setting work of the World Climate Research Programme's Joint Scientific Committee. He also is a member and past chair of the National Academies' Climate Research Committee, and a member of the National Academies' Panel on Advancing the Science of Climate Change. Busalacchi says:
"The science that underpins our understanding of climate change is both sound and robust. The human influence on the Earth's climate system is unequivocal. The risks that human society faces due to climate change call for action in a concerted intergovernmental manner."----------------------------------------------------
Thomas Schelling is an economist at the University of Maryland who won the 2005 Nobel Prize in Economics for his work in game theory. Schelling has published highly influential published works on climate change, energy and environmental policy, nuclear proliferation and arms control. He says:
"I know of no peacetime historical precedent for the kind of international cooperation that is going to be required to deal with climate change."----------------------------------------------------
Thomas Hilde, a research professor in the School of Public Policy, is an expert in international environmental and sustainable development policy and ethics who will participate in Copenhagen as a delegate with the Heinrich Boll Foundation. He says:
"The common pessimistic view regarding [the UNFCCC conference] says that individual nations' interests are currently too conflicting and too entrenched to generate any substantive agreement in Copenhagen. However, nations usually don't know exactly and comprehensively what their interests are entering into discussions involving a collective action and cooperation problem.
"Nations are showing up in Copenhagen to negotiate, and in the course of the negotiations national interests have room for at least slight re-adjustments. Though any optimism must be tempered, pessimists' projected outcome is hardly a foregone conclusion."-----------------------------------------------------
Donald Kettl, dean of the University of Maryland School of Public Policy, is a widely sought after expert on reshaping governments who has testified frequently at congressional hearings, appeared widely on national TV news shows and contributed to op-ed pages in The New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, and other major newspapers. His most recent book is "The Next Government of the United State." Kettl says: "This isn’t just about climate change—it’s about trying to create a game-changing strategy for the world’s nations to work together to solve problems for which there just aren't a governance system.
"Climate change is important enough. But there are a host of issues, from food safety to financial regulation, that pose big threats and that are going to require fresh, new, and effective forms of international collaboration. We’re building this bridge as we go, and how well we do on climate change will shape our ability to attack a host of other critically important puzzles."_____________________________________________________-----------------------------------------------------Below is contact and other information for a number of UM climate experts, including those featured above. A full list and searchable database of UM's more than 30 experts is at: http://www.newsdesk.umd.edu/experts/hottopic.cfm?hotlist_id=105-----------------------------------------------------Nathan E. Hultman Assistant Professor, School of Public Policy, & Assoc. Dir, Joint Global Change Research Institute
Expertise Key Words: Climate change, carbon markets, international climate policy, energy policy, low-carbon energy, nuclear power, renewable energy, climate risk, energy technology innovation, risk & decision making under scientific uncertainty, science and society.
_____________________________________________________Antonio J. Busalacchi Director, University of Maryland Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center; Professor, Atmospheric and Oceanic Science; and Chair of the World Climate Research Programme's Joint Scientific CommitteeRead about Busalacchi's work with the Joint Scientific Committee:http://www.newsdesk.umd.edu/scitech/release.cfm?ArticleID=1860
Expertise Key Words: Climate Variability and change: global change, role of tropical ocean circulation in the coupled climate system, climate change, El Nino, La Nina, numerical modeling of climate change; environmental modeling and earth remote sensing.
-----------------------------------------------------
Thomas C. Schelling Dist. Univ. Professor School of Public Policy
Expertise Key Words: Schelling won 2005 Nobel Prize in Economics for his work in game theory. He has published highly influential works in a many areas including nuclear proliferation & arms control, terrorism, organized crime, energy & environmental policy, climate change, and racial segregation.
-----------------------------------------------------
Thomas C. Hilde Research ProfessorSchool of Public Policy
Expertise Key Words: environment: climate change, biodiversity, sustainability, legitimacy, environmental governance, international environmental agreements; human rights; torture (book editor for "On Torture"); international ethics and relations; foreign affairs; globalization; pragmatism; development; philosophy.
-----------------------------------------------------
Donald F. Kettl Dean, School of Public Policy
Expertise Key Words: Public policy and public management with a specialty in the management of public organization; federalism; budgeting; and U.S. politics.
-----------------------------------------------------
Christopher O. Justice Professor, GeographyA recent National Academies' report co-chaired by Justice recommended a reorganization of the U.S. climate change research program around critical themes at the intersection of science and society." Read release at: http://www.newsdesk.umd.edu/scitech/release.cfm?ArticleID=1836
Expertise Key Words: land cover, land use change, satellite imaging of land cover, climate change (global warming), the extent and impacts of global fire, global agricultural monitoring, and associated information technology and decision support systems.
-----------------------------------------------------
Anthony C. Janetos Director, Joint Global Change Research InstituteJoint Global Change Research Institute
Janetos was a co-author of major federal climate report released in June by the White House Office of Science and Technology, which called the study the "most comprehensive, authoritative report on global climate change impacts in the United States." Read release at: http://www.newsdesk.umd.edu/scitech/release.cfm?ArticleID=1915
Expertise Key Words: environmental science, climate change (commonly called global warming), biodiversity, land-cover and land-use change, satellite imaging, terrestrial ecosystems
-----------------------------------------------------
Phillip A. ArkinDirector of the Cooperative Institute for Climate and Satellites, and Deputy Director of UM's Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center
In May 2009 a nationwide consortium led by Arkin, Busalacchi and other University of Maryland colleagues won a competition for a new NOAA-supported Cooperative Institute for Climate and Satellites (CICS) that is receiving $93 million in funding over five years. Read news release about this award: http://www.newsdesk.umd.edu/scitech/release.cfm?ArticleID=1902
Expertise Key Words: earth science, climate change (popularly called global warming), precipitation (rain, snow, etc.), and how precipitation responds to and affects various aspects of the Earth System
-----------------------------------------------------
Eugenia E. Kalnay Distinguished University ProfessorAtmospheric and Oceanic Science and Earth System Science Interdisciplinary InstituteKalnay is a pioneer in modeling and prediction of weather and climate and in the study of temperature effects of land-use change. Read recent release on her latest study of temperature effects of land-use change in U.S.: http://www.newsdesk.umd.edu/scitech/release.cfm?ArticleID=2004
Expertise Key Words: Numerical Weather Forecasting; Atmospheric Predictability and ensemble forecasting; Use of satellite observations; Data assimilation; Seasonal and Interannual prediction; Land-use change impact on climate change
-----------------------------------------------------
Raghu Murtugudde Professor Atmospheric & Oceanic ScienceRead about Murtugudde's development of a forecasting program to predict climate change impacts on the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem: http://betweenthecolumns.umd.edu/2009/10/07/bayresearch/
Expertise Key Words: Climate, climate change, global warming, El Niño and La Niña, role of carbon cycle and ecosystems in climate, variability of the carbon sources and sinks, physical biosphere-climate interaction, oceans and climate, phytoplankton, climate change impacts on Chesapeake Bay
-----------------------------------------------------
James A. Edmonds Senior Staff Scientist and Technical Leader of Economic ProgramsJoint Global Change Research Institute
Expertise Key Words: economic and policy issues of global change, climate change and sustainable development, technological strategies for stabilizing greenhouse gases and promoting practical ways to promote both economic growth and environmental quality
-----------------------------------------------------
Michael S. Kearney Professor Geography
Expertise Key Words: Sea level rise; coastal marshes in the Chesapeake Bay; shore erosion; disappearing islands and land loss; sedimentation in the Bay; remote sensing; impacts of storms on storm surge processes; hurricanes; Rita and Galveston; climate change and sea level rise.
----------------------------------------------------
Ross J. SalawitchProfessor, Atmospheric & Oceanic Science, Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center, Chemistry/Biochemistry
Expertise Key Words:Stratospheric ozone depletion and recovery; air quality and the global carbon cycle; greenhouse gases and recovery of the ozone layer; how organic bromocarbons, produced by biological processes in the ocean, affect ozone photochemistry; tropospheric ozone, remote sensing of the atmosphere
RSS