David Easterling

On January 18, 2017, NPR reported that last year is the hottest on record. Perhaps more alarming is the news that 2016 is the third consecutive year to break this record.

To translate what this means to global climate change, and how that affects the world’s population, David Easterling, chief of the Scientific Services Division of the National Oceanic and Atmosphere Administration’s (NOAA) National Centers for Environmental Information, will deliver a presentation on “A Scientific View of Climate Change” at 4 p.m. Tuesday, March 28 in AB Hall Bryan Cave Moot Courtroom. A reception will follow.

Hosting his visit is Washington University’s Weidenbaum Center on the Economy, Government, and Public Policy.

Easterling is an international expert on the detection of climate change in the observed record, particularly as it relates to changes in extreme climate events. He has authored or co-authored more than sixty research articles in journals such as Science, Nature and the Journal of Climate.

Easterling joined NOAA in 1990 and has served in his current position for 15 years. After earning a PhD from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, he joined the faculty in the Climate and Meteorology Department at Indiana University-Bloomington.

A major contributor to the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Easterling is considered among the world’s top climate scientists. IPCC experts volunteer for a massive undertaking: to synthesize the most recent climate science findings every five to seven years, then prepare a written report. Of the five comprehensive written assessments issued by the IPCC since its founding in 1988, Easterling has contributed to the second, third and fourth assessment reports, serving as a lead author for the latter.