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The IC3 organises a debate on climate change with internationally renowned experts

By 14 de May de 2009November 18th, 2020No Comments
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 14.05.2009

The IC3 organises a debate on climate change with internationally renowned experts

A debate on "Climate Change: new challenges for the XXI century", organised by the Catalan Institute for Climate Sciences (), based at the Barcelona Science Park, was held on the 13 May at the Royal Academy of Sciences. The objective of the event was to establish a space for debate and reflection concerning the effects of global warming on water, energy, food and nutrition, tourism, and population's health, especially in what concerns the proliferation of infectious diseases.

The main topics covered in this debate included: climate research in Catalonia; the effects of climate change on biodiversity and on infectious diseases; the future of the Amazon; prediction of climate impact on health; the latest scientific advents in climate change research; the improvements in the simulation capacity of climate variability, both locally and worldwide; and the international programmes and infrastructures on climate research.

Scientists emphasised the importance of being able to predict climate impact on our surroundings, and extreme events such as draughts, heat waves and floods, by means of climate simulation models at a worldwide scale and the connections between these models and regional climate. In this sense, experts also alerted that the Mediterranean area is a hot spot on the planet and that in just a few decades it will suffer the drastic effects of climate change and advised of the need to invest in research and to increase the scientific knowledge from the Mediterranean to the rest of the world.

The event gathered internationally renowned scientists with expertise in climate sciences such as: James Kinter, director of the Center for Ocean-Land-Atmosphere Studies (USA); Stephen Griffies, scientist from the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (USA); Filippo Giorgi, vicepresident of WG1 from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC); Andrew Dobson, researcher at the Department of Ecology and Evolutive Biology at Princeton University (USA); Jürg Luterbacher, project researcher and coordinator at the Institute of Geography at the University of Berna (Switzerland); Philp M. Fearnside, professor at the Department of Ecology at the National Institute for Research in the Amazon (Brazil); Mercedes Pascual, researcher at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (USA); Eduardo Zorita, scientist at the Institute for Coastal Research of the GKSS Research Centre in Geesthacht (Germany).

According to Xavier Rodó, director of the Catalan Institute for Climate Sciences (IC3): «Climate change has to be a top priority in the political agenda of all states, as it already is in the international agenda. IC 3 is the first institute specialising in climate research in Spain and will be an international reference in this discipline. We are “historically delayed”; in other words, we have fallen behind in climate research within our geographical area. The Institute will fill this existing gap in the scientific structure in Spain and Southern Europe».

The Catalan Institute for Climate Sciences (IC3) was created in 2008 and is part of the Research Centres Programme (CERCA) of the Commissionate for Universities and Research. The members of its patronage are the Department of Innovation, Universities and Enterprises and the Department of Environment and Housing of the Generalitat de Catalunya, as well as the University of Barcelona. The international committee of IC 3 is comprised of 14 researchers affiliated to the most renowned institutions in climate sciences in Europe, the United States and South America.