Rafe Pomerance, Washington

Climate Change: The implications of the unraveling of the Arctic

Trinity College, Old Combination Room (OCR)
5.30pm Tue 13 November

This will be a talk followed by an open discussion.

For more of a background on Rafe Pomerance, read the New York Times Magazine feature titled: 'Losing Earth: The Decade WeAlmost Stopped Climate Change'

Rafe Pomerance is Chairman of Arctic 21, a network of organizations focused on communicating issues of Arctic climate change to policy-makers and the general public.

Beginning in the late 1970s, he played a key role in raising awareness of the risks of climate change for United States policy-makers. In the mid 1980's Pomerance's work led to Congressional hearings that put the climate issue on the national and international agenda. In 1993 Pomerance joined the US State Department as a Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Environment and Development and had responsibility for numerous multilateral issues including climate change and ozone depletion. It was during that period that the Kyoto Protocol was negotiated. In 1999 Pomerance left the State Department to start a new non-profit (Climate Policy Center) dedicated to a bipartisan approach to a changing Arctic and the risks posed by the increasing loss of Greenland ice.

As a consultant he has recently devoted his work to reframing of the climate issue around local impacts which have become increasingly visible eg sea level rise in Florida; he has also continued his focus on the Arctic most recently helping to organize a workshop at Columbia's Earth Institute, "White Arctic, Blue Arctic: Exploring the Restoration of Arctic Sea Ice."

He is now involved in a strategic review of U.S. options as the U.S. Chairmanship of the Arctic Council approaches. He has also designed an effort to encourage the U.S. Government to begin a geoengineering research program.