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Global Environmental Change
“An exploration of both the scientific causes of global environmental change and
the integrative and complex nature of the societal response to such changes”.
We strive to give you an appreciation of the “big picture”, and to remind you of the
reasons why global environmental issues are at the forefront of the political, as
well as the scientific agenda. We also aim to encourage a cross-disciplinary
approach to problems and research in global change.
The course has three elements
A taught element – the guest lectures
A research element – the project
A dissemination element – the conference
Week No
Time
Room
1-7
Tuesdays 14.00-17.00
EFRY 01.02
8-10
Tuesdays 14.00-17.00
EFRY 0.03 & EFRY 1.02
1, 6, 7
Wednesdays 10.00-12.00
LT4
2-4
Wednesdays 11.00-12.00
EFRY 01.02
5
Wednesday 10.00-12.00
EFRY 01.08
8-10
Wednesdays 10.00-12.00
EFRY 0.04 & EFRY 0.07
11
Wednesdays 09.00-17.00
EFRY 01.08 & S0.31
The guest lectures
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During weeks 2 through 7, we have arranged for a series of distinguished speakers to
address you on topics of major concern in global environmental change. You will find
the talks and brief biographies of the lecturers, at
http://www.uea.ac.uk/env/teaching/gec_lectures/welcome.
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Prominent people with distinctive views and positions of influence
Contributors to the debate about global change.
Lecturers have complete freedom to address you as they wish
“keynote talk” types of presentation
Opportunity for interaction after the lecture
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Assessment associated with the lectures: For each lecture, we require that you write
a short (~ 1 page) appreciation or critique of some aspect of the talk.
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This can be something you found particularly interesting in lecture
or something you particularly agree, or particularly disagree, with the speaker about.
Reference to other literature encouraged
Three of these one-page comments will be assessed – 33 % of course assessment.
W Slot
k
Date
Room
Topic
Presenter
2 14.0017.00
Tues
18 Jan
EFRY
01.02
Valuing nature: price tags versus
deliberation
Prof Kerry Turner CBE, Director, CSERGE
2 11.0012.00
Wed
19 Jan
EFRY
01.02
Can society adapt to climate
change?
Prof Mike Hulme, Executive Director, Tyndall Centre
3 14.0017.00
Tues
25 Jan
EFRY
01.02
Antarctica and global change
Prof Chris Rapley CBE, Director, British Antarctic
Survey
3 11.0012.00
Wed
26 Jan
EFRY
01.02
Assessing the environmental impact
of GM crops
Prof Phil Dale, John Innes Centre
4 14.0017.00
Tues 1
Feb
EFRY
01.02
From the past to the future
Dr Tim Lenton, Environmental Sciences
4 11.0012.00
Wed 2
Feb
EFRY
01.02
Biodiversity and global change
Prof Andrew Watkinson, Environmental Sciences
5 14.0017.00
Tues 8
Feb
EFRY
01.02
The natural carbon cycle in the 21st
century
Prof Peter Cox, Hadley Centre
5 10.0012.00
Wed 9
Feb
EFRY
01.08
People, resources and climate
Lord Oxburgh KBE FRS, Shell International Limited
6 14.0017.00
Tues
15 Feb
EFRY
01.02
The climate problem: diagnosis,
prognosis, therapy
Prof John Schellnhuber CBE, Research Director,
Tyndall Centre
6 10.0012.00
Wed
16 Feb
LT4
The skeptical environmentalist
Bjorn Lomborg, Department of Political Sciences,
University of Aaarhus, Denmark
7 14.0017.00
Tues
22 Feb
EFRY
01.02
Sustainability: from the natural to
the human world
Sir Crispin Tickell GCMG KCVO, formerly UK
ambassador to the United Nations
7 10.0012.00
Wed
23 Feb
LT4
Environmental groups –science
based or scaremongering?
Mike Childs, Campaign Coordinator, Friends of the
Earth
Aspects of the Environmental
Change Debate
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Academic and scientific
Economic and social
Environmental Campaigns and awareness
National and international relations and
politics
Subjects
• Climate Change:
– Science:
• Carbon cycle
• Antarctica
– Society and adaptation
• The goal of sustainability
– A political perspective
– People, resources and climate
– Valuing nature
• Genetically modified organisms
• Biodiversity and ecosystem change
• The Earth as a system
– What the past tells us
– Properties of the system
• Environmental campaigns and NGOs
Guest lectures
Professor Kerry Turner CBE
Director, CSERGE, UEA
Valuing nature: price tags versus deliberation
Kerry Turner is the Director of CSERGE and a Professor in the School of Environmental
Sciences at the University of East Anglia (UEA). Kerry specialises in environmental economics,
coastal zone and wetland management, conservation economics and waste management
research. He has published widely on these subjects including a number of best selling texts.
Professor Mike Hulme
Executive Director, Tyndall Centre, UEA
Can society adapt to climate change?
Mike Hulme is executive director of the Tyndall Centre, a mulit-institute centre that
is the UK’s main body for research into adaptation to global change. The Tyndall
centre is concerned with the construction and application of climate change
scenarios for impact, adaptation and integrated assessment. Also the evaluation of
climate models, the development of global and national observational climate data
sets, and African climate and desertification.
Professor Chris Rapley CBE
Director, British Antarctic Survey
Antarctica and Global Change
Chris has been Director of the British Antarctic Survey since 199, the body that
undertakes most of the UK research on the Antarctic continent and in the Southern
Ocean. A substantial proportion of that research is related to global change, with
signals of past climate change unlocked from ice cores and lake sediments,
discovery and monitoring of the Antarctic ozone depletion, and studies of present
Guest lectures
Professor Phil Dale
John Innes Centre
Assessing the environmental impact of GM crops
Phil Dale is a Professor in the Department of Crop Genetics at the John Innes Centre. The
main focus of Phil's research has been on the production and analysis of transgenic
plants. He is particularly interested in the interface between science and society, and
especially in the opportunities and challenges presented by advances in molecular
genetics.
Dr Tim Lenton
Reader in Earth System Analysis, Environmental Sciences, UEA
From the past to the future
Tim Lenton has recently joined the Environmental Sciences faculty as a reader in Earth systems
science. He is a recipient of a 2004 Phillip Leverhulme prize, given “to recognise the outstanding
research achievements of young scholars of distinction and promise”. His current research includes
Earth system modelling, Gaia theory, and co-evolution of life and the environment.
Professor Andrew Watkinson
Professor of Ecology (ENV/BIO, UEA), Director of the Centre for Ecology,
Evolution and Conservation, Tyndall Centre Programme Manager for Managing
Coastal Zones
Biodiversity and global change
Andrew's research interests centre around population ecology and its application to
conservation, agricultural and coastal systems. He was one of the successful coapplicants for the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research and is currently
programme manager for the section on 'Managing Coastal Zones'. Recent research in the
coastal zone has focused on an analysis of the aggregative and functional responses of
herbivores and their consequences for plant populations.
Guest lectures
Professor Peter Cox
Head of climate, chemistry and ecosystems at Hadley Centre, UK
The natural carbon cycle in the 21st century
The Met Office Hadley Centre is widely regarded as the world leader in modelling climate
change and its effects. Peter Cox headed the group that developed the first climate
model with an interactive description of the Earth’s vegetation, enabling projections of
the global carbon cycle into the future.
Lord Oxburgh KBE FRS
People, resources and climate
Ron Oxburgh followed a distinguished career as an earth scientist at Oxford University,
with a spell as the chief scientist at the Ministry of Defence and the role of Rector of
Imperial College. Recently he has taken on the role of Senior Independent Chairman at
Shell International Limited. He is unusual in having both a strong voice in the oil industry
and the perspective of the concerned scientist.
Professor John Schellnhuber CBE
Research Director, Tyndall Centre, UEA
The climate problem: diagnosis, prognosis, therapy
Born in 1950 in Ortenburg, Germany, John trained in physics and mathematics and in
1993 became Founding Director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research
(PIK). He has published more than 150 articles and books on solid state physics, the
theory of complex non-linear systems, coastal zone research, and regional and global
environmental analysis.
Guest lectures
Dr Bjørn Lomborg
Department of Political Sciences, University of Aarhus, Denmark
The Skeptical Environmentalist
Bjørn Lomborg is an associate professor of statistics in the Department of Political
Science at the University of Aarhus. In 1998 he published four lengthy articles
about the state of our environment in the leading Danish newspaper, which resulted
in a firestorm debate spanning over 400 articles in major metropolitan newspapers.
The articles lead to the publication of The Skeptical Environmentalist in 2001, which
has now been published in Danish, Swedish, Icelandic, German, Portuguese,
Spanish, Italian, French, Korean and Japanese.
Sir Crispin Tickell GCMB KCVO DCL
Formerly UK Ambassador to the United Nations and Warden of Green
College, Oxford
Sustainability, from the natural to the human world
A former member of the British Diplomatic Service and Warden of Green College, Sir
Crispin is currently Chancellor at the University of Kent at Canterbury. He has
worked within numerous national and international scientific academic and
professional organisations and throughout his career Sir Crispin has been involved
with the public policy implications of scientific understanding. He has written and
contributed to numerous books on environmental issues including human population
and biodiversity.
Mike Childs
Formerly campaign Coordinator, Friends of the Earth
Environmental groups: science-based, or scaremongering
The Projects
• Review or research an aspect of global
change or response to such change
• (mostly) Multidisciplinary
• Mixed-expertise groups, formed by ranking
your interests
• Bidding process to assign projects
The project report
• In sections, including abstract/exec
summary, introduction, conclusions.
• At least one section “signed” by each
group member
• Size: 25 pages min, 50 pages max.
• 50% of the course assessment
Project Mentors
• ENV Postgrad students, researchers and
faculty
• Use some of the expertise in ENV that
undergrads otherwise rarely see
Mentor
Title
1
Julian Andrews
(faculty)
The end of the dinosaurs:
with a bang, or a
whimper?
2
Karabi Biswas
(Pg student)
Acid rain, is the problem
over?
3
Peter Brimblecombe
(Faculty)
Climate change and the
weatherning of building
materials
4
Ramzah Dambul
(PG student)
Transboundary
atmospheric pollution in
SE Asia
5
Suraje Dessai
(PG student)
Can local adaption to
climate change bring
global benefits?
6
Marie Ekstrom
(researcher)
UK Rainfall extremes,
present and projected
7
Simon Gerrard
(Faculty)
The potential for Carbon
reduction by non-standard
mechanisms
8
Claire Hanson
(researcher)
Climate change and the
North Atlantic Storm track
9
Zack Hickman
(PG student)
The impact of clean-up
methods and legislation on
organic contaminant levels
in soils
Title
Mentor
Title
10
Jamie Kettle
(researcher)
Climate change impact
on cod and herring
fisheries
11
Matt Livermore
(PG student)
Climate change and heat
stress in humans: is there
a real threat?
12
Farhad Nejadkoorki
(PG student)
The impact of road
traffic on CO2-induced
climate change
13
Tim O'Riordan
(Faculty)
1) Biodiversity and
global livelihoods; 2)
Designing wildlife
refuges for future global
warming scenarios
14
Jane Powell
(researcher)
Will a hydrogen
economy contribute to a
sustainable future?
15
Glen Richardson
(Phd Student)
The Day After
Tomorrow: Do climate
models really say we will
be plunged into an ice
age? And how do the
public perceive the issue?
16
Gill Seyfang
(researcher)
Mud, straw and tyres: is
low impact development
a sustainable housing
solution?
17
Andrew Watkinson
(faculty)
How should we respond
to sea level rise in the
UK?
Title
Project timetable
• Week 1 – rank interests of students
• Week 2 – Assign groups
• Week 3 – bid for projects: initial meetings
with mentors
• Week 3 – 10 research and write up.
• Week 10 end – hand in
• Week 11 – Presentations at Conference
Conference
• Wednesday 20th April – Week 11
• Two parallel sessions
• Each group gives presentation (15% of
course assessment)
• Lunch, wine reception
• Evening – ENV ball at the Assembly
rooms in the city.