Will Steffen

Will Steffen
(2010)
Alma mater University of Florida (PhD, MSc)
University of Missouri (BSc)
Known for Advocating with Paul Crutzen the concept of the Anthropocene.
Initiating with Johan Rockström the international debate on planetary boundaries
Scientific career
Fields Climate science
Institutions Climate Change Institute at the Australian National University
Website www.climatecommission.gov.au/about/will-steffen/

Will Steffen (born 1947) is an American chemist. He was the executive director of the Australian National University (ANU) Climate Change Institute and a member of the Australian Climate Commission until its dissolution in September 2013.[1] From 1998 to 2004, he was the executive director of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme, a co-ordinating body of national environmental change organisations based in Stockholm.[2]

Life and career

Steffen completed a BSc in Chemical Engineering from the University of Missouri in 1970. The University of Florida awarded him an MSc in 1972 and a PhD in 1975.[3] He is widely published on climate science. His research interests range over climate change and Earth system science issues, with a focus on sustainability. He has written on adapting land use to climate change, bringing human processes into the modelling and analysis of the Earth system, and the history of and future prospects for the relationship between the natural world and humans.[2] Steffen has also been prominent advocating along with Paul Crutzen the concept of the Anthropocene,[4] and initiating along with Johan Rockström an international debate on planetary boundaries and the "safe operating space" for humanity.[5]

Steffen served as science adviser to the Australian Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency.[2] He has been a member of the advisory board of the Australian Bureau of Meteorology and worked with the Prime Minister's Science, Engineering and Innovation Council. He was also on an advisory panel in Colorado with the National Center for Atmospheric Research.[3]

Currently, Steffen is on the Science Advisory Committee of the APEC Climate Centre in Korea. He is honorary professor at the Copenhagen University's Department of Geography and Geology and visiting researcher at the Stockholm Resilience Centre.[3] He is the chair of the Federal Government's Antarctic Science Advisory Committee, and advises the Australian Government in further roles as scientific adviser to the Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency and as expert adviser to the Multi-Party Climate Change Committee.[3] Steffen also sat on the Australian Climate Commission.[6]

In 2011, he was the principal author of a government climate report, The Critical Decade,[7] which advocated a tax should be placed on carbon.[8][9][10]

Some recent publications

  • Colin N. Waters et al.:The Anthropocene is functionally and stratigraphically distinct from the Holocene. In: Science 351, No. 6269 (2016) doi:10.1126/science.aad2622.
  • Steffen W et al., (2015): Planetary boundaries: Guiding human development on a changing planet. In: Science 349, No. 6254, pp. 1286-1287, doi:10.1126/science.1259855.
  • Will Steffen, Johan Rockström, and Robert Costanza (2011). "How defining planetary boundaries can transform our approach to growth". Solutions. 2 (3).
  • Steffen W, Grinevald J, Crutzen P and McNeill J (2011) "The Anthropocene: conceptual and historical perspectives" Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A 369(1938): 842–867. doi:10.1098/rsta.2010.0327
  • Steffen W (ed.) (2010) Australia's Biodiversity and Climate Change Csiro Publishing. ISBN 978-0-643-09605-9.
  • Zalasiewicz J, Williams M, Steffen W and Crutzen P (2010) "The new world of the Anthropocene" Environmental Science & Technology, 44(7): 2228–2231. doi:10.1021/es903118j
  • Steffen W (2008) "Looking Back to the Future" Ambio, 37(14): 507–513. doi:10.1579/0044-7447-37.sp14.507
  • Steffen W, Crutzen P, McNeill J and Hibbard KA (2008) "Stages of the Anthropocene: Assessing the Human Impact on the Earth System" American Geophysical Union, Annual Meeting 2008, abstract #GC22B-01.
  • Robin L and Steffen W (2007) "History for the Anthropocene" History Compass, 5(5): 1694–1719. doi:10.1111/j.1478-0542.2007.00459.x
  • Costanza R, Graumlich L and Steffen W (eds) (2007) Integrated History and Future of People on Earth MIT Press. ISBN 978-0-262-03366-4.
  • Steffen, W (2005) Global Change and the Earth System: A Planet Under Pressure Birkhäuser. ISBN 978-3-540-26594-8.
  • Gordon LJ, Steffen W, Jönsson BF, Folke C, Falkenmark M and Johannessen Å (2005) "Human modification of global water vapor flows from the land surface" Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (USA), 102: 7612–7617.
  • Steffen W, Andreae MO, Bolin B, Cox P, Crutzen PJ, Cubasch U, Nakicenovic N, Talaue-McManus L and Turner II BL (2004) "Group Report: Earth system dynamics in the Anthropocene" In: Schellnhuber H-J, Earth system analysis for sustainability, pages 313–340, MIT Press, ISBN 978-0-262-19513-3.
  • Steffen W, Andreae MO, Bolin B, Crutzen PJ, Cox P, Cubasch U, Held H, Nakicenovic N, Scholes R, Talaue-McManus L and Turner II BL (2004) "Abrupt changes: the Achilles heels of the Earth System" Environment, 46(3): 9–20.
  • Steffen W and Lambin E (2004) "Earth System Functioning in the Anthropocene: Human Impacts on the Global Environment" Pages 112–144 in: Interactions between global change and human health, Working group 2004, Pontificiae Academiae Scientiarum, Scripta Varia 106. ISBN 978-88-7761-085-0.
  • Crutzen P and Steffen W (2003) "How Long Have We Been in the Anthropocene Era?" Climatic Change, Editorial Comment.61(3): 251–257. doi:10.1023/B:CLIM.0000004708.74871.62

Notes

  1. ↑ Arup, Tom (19 September 2013). "Abbott shuts down Climate Commission". Theage.com.au. Retrieved 24 September 2013.
  2. 1 2 3 Professor Will Steffen ANU Climate Change Institute. Retrieved 11 July 2011.
  3. 1 2 3 4 Professor Will Steffen Australian Research Council.
  4. ↑ Steffen W, Crutzen PJ and J. R. McNeill JR (2007) "The Anthropocene: are humans now overwhelming the great forces of Nature?" AMBIO, 36:614–621.
  5. ↑ Rockström, J.; Steffen, W.; Noone, K.; Persson, Å.; Chapin Fs, F. S.; Lambin, E. F.; Lenton, T. M.; Scheffer, M.; Folke, C.; Schellnhuber, H. J.; Nykvist, B. R.; De Wit, C. A.; Hughes, T.; Van Der Leeuw, S.; Rodhe, H.; Sörlin, S.; Snyder, P. K.; Costanza, R.; Svedin, U.; Falkenmark, M.; Karlberg, L.; Corell, R. W.; Fabry, V. J.; Hansen, J.; Walker, B.; Liverman, D.; Richardson, K.; Crutzen, P.; Foley, J. A. (2009). "A safe operating space for humanity". Nature. 461 (7263): 472–475. doi:10.1038/461472a. PMID 19779433.
  6. ↑ "About the Commission". Climate Commission. 2013. Retrieved 24 September 2013.
  7. ↑ Climate Commission Secretariat (2013). "The Critical Decade: Climate science, risks and responses" (PDF-4.56 Mb). Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency. ISBN 978-1-921299-50-6. Retrieved 6 April 2015.
  8. ↑ "We're bit players in a global drama" The Australian, 24 May 2011.
  9. ↑ "Looking at the critical climate decade". Stock Journal, 27 May 2011.
  10. ↑ CSIRO scientists cited on climate doomsday The Australian, 5 July 2011.
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