| Roger A. Pielke, Jr. | |
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Dr. Pielke
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| Born | November 2, 1968 United States |
| Residence | United States |
| Citizenship | American |
| Fields | Political science, Science and Technology Policy |
| Institutions | University of Colorado at Boulder, Oxford University's James Martin Institute for Science and Civilization, NCAR Environmental and Societal Impacts Group |
| Alma mater | University of Colorado at Boulder (B.A. 1990; M.A. 1992; Ph.D. 1994) |
| Known for | public policy and science, politicization of science, environment-society interactions |
| Notable awards | Eduard Brueckner Prize (2006), NRC Board on Ocean Sciences Roger Revelle Commemorative Lecturer (2006), Sigma Xi Distinguished Lectureship Award (2000) |
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Notes
Father Roger A. Pielke, atmospheric scientist (land and sea interactions with atmosphere, atmospheric dynamics, climate change) |
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Roger A. Pielke, Jr. (born November 2, 1968) is an American professor in the Environmental Studies Program and a Fellow of the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) where he served as Director of the Center for Science and Technology Policy Research at the University of Colorado at Boulder from 2001 to 2007. Pielke was a visiting scholar at Oxford University's James Martin Institute for Science and Civilization [1] in the Said Business School in the 2007-2008 academic year. His interests include understanding the politicization of science, decision making under uncertainty, and policy education for scientists in areas such as climate change, disaster mitigation, and world trade.
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Pielke earned a B.A. in mathematics (1990), a M.A. in public policy (1992), and a Ph.D. in political science, all from the University of Colorado at Boulder. Prior to his positions at CU-Boulder, from 1993 to 2001 he was a staff scientist [2] in the Environmental and Societal Impacts Group of the National Center for Atmospheric Research. From 2002 to 2004 Pielke was Director of Graduate Studies for the CU-Boulder Graduate Program in Environmental Studies and in 2001 students selected him for the Outstanding Graduate Advisor Award. Pielke serves on numerous editorial boards and advisory committees, retains many professional affiliations, and sat on the Board of Directors of WeatherData, Inc. from 2001 to 2006.
Roger is married with three children and resides in Boulder, Colorado.
Pielke has written extensively on climate change policy.
His views on climate science are difficult to determine. On the one hand he has written that he accepts the IPCC view of the underlying science:
On the other hand, in 2010 he asserted that "I don’t think [temperature] is the right metric to use to express concern [about climate change]" and that the following "bathtub analogy" was an appropriate summary of the "consensus on the tenets of climate science":
In any case, he argues that:
and from this he concludes that
(see also [4]; and argued as long ago as 1998 [5]).
On the issues of hurricanes and climate change he has argued that the trend in increasing damage from hurricanes is primarily due to societal factors rather than change in the frequency and intensity [6].
His early work was on the Space Shuttle program. In 1993 he argued that the shuttle was expensive and risky - that it was "probable" that another orbiter would be lost within 20-35 flights [7] (approximately 60 flights passed before the loss of Space Shuttle Columbia). Shortly before the loss of Columbia he warned that loss of another shuttle was only a matter of time [8].
He has also been critical of the space station program [9].
Pielke was invited to write for Regulation [10], a magazine published by the Cato Institute, a libertarian think-tank [11]. Pielke has also published articles in Atlantic Monthly, The New Republic, Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times [12]. He also appeared in a Fox News special Global Warming: The Debate Continues, that featured several prominent global warming skeptics and industry consultants [13]. He has also appeared multiple times on CNN, The Weather Channel, and in many other media outlets [14]. For his own part, Pielke characterizes his political views as "consonant with those of the Blue Dog Democrats who argue that the stale extreme left vs. right approach requires a breath of fresh air" [15]. Pielke's views are cited by conservatives [16] [17] [18] and he has complained that he has been pilloried by a "liberal slime machine."[19]
In January, 2007 when the Government Oversight and Reform Committee of the U.S. Congress, led by Representative Henry Waxman (D-CA), initiated hearings on political interference into the work of government scientists by the Bush Administration, Pielke testified that politics and science have a long history of being intermixed at the highest levels of government. In his written testimony Pielke described the Bush Administration's behavior as "ham-handed," "overbearing," and indicative of "hyper-controlling strategies for the management of information" [20]. Pielke also criticized a memo prepared for the hearing by Rep. Waxman's staff as reflecting the same dynamics underlying the behavior of the Bush Administration [21].
Pielke is author, co-author or co-editor of five books, most recently The Honest Broker: Making Sense of Science in Policy and Politics (2007, Cambridge University Press) and The Climate Fix: What Scientists and Politicians Won't Tell You About Global Warming (2010, Basic Books).