Jean-Pascal van Ypersele

Biography:

Jean-Pascal van Ypersele de Strihou is a Belgian Professor of Climatology and Environmental Sciences at the Université catholique de Louvain (UCL), in Louvain-la-Neuve (Belgium).

He obtained a PhD in physicsat the Université catholique de Louvain (1986 with highest honours) and made his doctoral research in climatology at the National Center for Atmospheric Research(NCAR), (Colorado, USA) on the effect of global warming on Antarctic sea ice.

Jean-Pascal van Ypersele is Vice-Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), and participates as scientific adviser to the United Nations conferences on climate issues. He teaches climatology and environmental sciences, and directs the Master programme in Science and Management of theEnvironment at the UCL. Since 1993, he is a member of the Belgian Federal Council for Sustainable Development, and he chairs its Working Group on Energy and Climate.

Awards

2006: Energy andenvironment award from the International Polar Foundation

Jean-Pascal van Ypersele (Brussels, 1957) has a Ph. D. in Physics from the Belgian Université catholique de Louvain (UCL, 1986 with highest honours), based on work done at the U.S. National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR, Boulder, Colorado) on the effect of global warming on Antarctic sea ice. He has specialized in climate change modelling and the study of the impact of human activities on climate. He has authored papers on the modelling of seaice, of paleoclimates, of the climate of the 20th and 21st century, and of regional climate in Europe, Greenland, and Africa. His more recent work is related to integrated assessment modelling of climate stabilisation, and is done with economists in an interdisciplinary perspective. He has also published on the relations between climate and desertification, and the impacts of climate change on human activities and ecosystems. In 2008, he published a report on the mainstreaming of climate change adaptation and mitigation policies in the Belgian development cooperation. As professor at UCL (www.climate.be), he teaches, e.g., climatology, climate modelling, mathematical geography and environmental sciences, and directs the interdisciplinary Master programme in Science and Management of the Environment (www.uclouvain.be/cgse). He is the author of numerous scientific articles and popular works regarding climate change and sustainable development. He was a Lead Author for the WGII contribution to the Third Assessment Report of the IPCC and was elected in 2002 Vice-Chair of its Working Group II. For the IPCC Fourth assessment, in addition to his responsibilities as member of the IPCC Bureau, he was also active in the Steering Group of the Task Group on New Emission Scenarios He has participated to dozens of outreach events related to the IPCC work, in Belgium and abroad (including, e.g., Brazil, Canada, France, Italy, Peru, Poland, Russia, Spain, The Netherlands, and United States), and is regularly interviewed by the media (Belgian and international) on climate, environment, and sustainable development issues.

Jean-Pascal van Ypersele has been a member of the Belgian Federal Council for Sustainable Development since 1993, and he chairs its Working Group on "Energy and Climate". He has also been science advisor in the Belgian delegations to a dozen United Nations conferences including Rio (1992), Berlin (1995), Kyoto (1997), Buenos Aires (1998), Marrakech (2001), Delhi (2002), Milan (2003), Montreal (2005), Nairobi (2006), and Bali (2007). Among otherprizes, the federation of environmental NGOs "Interenvironnement- Wallonie" gave him in 1999 a "Palm for the environment", he was nominated in 2000 by the Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB) for the «Jean Teghem Prize» for scientific vulgarization, and he received in 2006 from the International Polar Foundation the Special Prize “Energy and Environment Award 2006”. In 2007-2008, he received the “Francqui Chair” at the ULB.