PICS CLIMATE CHANGE RESEARCH SFU UBC LECTURE SERIES

When: September 23, 2014 from 6:00 pm to 8:00 pm

Where: UBC Robson Square, Room C180, 800 Robson Street, Vancouver

Register: climatechangeadaptation.eventbrite.ca

Live Web Stream: pics.uvic.ca/events/live-webcast

Join moderator Tim Takaro, Faculty of Health Sciences, SFU, and speakers Stewart Cohen, Environment Canada, Lori Daniels, Faculty of Forestry, UBC and Jonathan O’Riordan, former Deputy Minister and now advisor with SFU’s ACT, as they share perspectives on climate change impacts and adaptation.

Stewart Cohen is coauthor of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Working Group II report, “Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability.” He’ll offer an overview of the report, including future risks for North America: extreme heat events, wildfires and urban flooding.

Lori Daniels will present on BC’s increasing and intensifying wildfires and the adaptation strategies we’ll need to learn to live with them, while Jon O’Riordan offers insight into the future Nexus – our life supporting water, energy, food and ecosystems in a changing climate – and the transformative policies and technologies we’ll need to manage and adapt. After their presentations, Tim Takaro will moderate questions and answers amongst the audience and panelists.

Stewart J. Cohen is senior researcher with the Climate Research Division of Environment Canada, and an Adjunct Professor with the Department of Forest Resources Management, at the University of British Columbia. His research interests are in developing participatory approaches for climate change adaptation through shared learning between researchers and practitioners. Since 1992, Dr. Cohen has contributed to publications of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which was awarded the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. For the IPCC 5th Assessment Report, Dr. Cohen is a member of the author team of the chapter “Foundations for Decision Making” and is also a member of the core writing team for the Summary for Policymakers, which was approved by governments in March 2014.

Lori Daniels is an Associate Professor of Forest Ecology in the Forest and Conservation Sciences Department at UBC-Vancouver, where she directs the Tree-Ring Lab at UBC.  Her degrees are in Ecology (BSc, UManitoba), Forest Ecology (MSc UBC) and Biogeography (PhD UColorado-Boulder).  Her research, published in the journals Science, Climatic Change, Ecology and International Journal of Wildland Fire, applies tree-ring analyses to investigate disturbance regimes and the impacts of climate and humans on forest dynamics. Given her interests in conservation and sustainable resource management, much of her research has practical application and is collaborative with NGOs, government agencies and private companies. She serves as a member of BC’s Prescribed Fire Council. With her graduate students, Lori has on-going research on fire regimes and forest resilience to climate change in the interior of British Columbia, Rocky Mountain National Parks and foothills of Alberta.

Jon O’Riordan is a former Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Sustainable Resource Management in the British Columbia Provincial Government. He has completed 35 years in the public service, mainly with the Provincial Government, in environmental management and land and resource planning. He is an Adjunct Professor with the School of Community ad Regional Planning at UBC and Research Director with the Climate Adaptation Team centred at Simon Fraser University. Dr. O’Riordan joined POLIS’ Water Sustainability Project in the Centre for Global Studies at the University of British Columbia as a strategic water policy advisor in 2007, where he focuses on provincial water policy reform and the ecological governance of water management.

Tim Takaro is a physician-scientist and Professor in the Faculty of Health Sciences at Simon Fraser University. He was trained in occupational and environmental medicine, public health and toxicology, at Yale, the University of North Carolina and University of Washington. Dr. Takaro’s research is primarily about the links between human exposures and disease, and determining effective public health based preventive solutions to such risks. Current research on human health and climate change focuses on water quality, extreme weather events and gastro-intestinal illness in BC communities and building and mapping watershed vulnerability and resilience in rural Nicaragua. He is Canadian co-chair of the Health Professionals Advisory Board to the International Joint Commission on border waters, Program Committee member for the Pacific Institute for Climate Solutions, chair of the Climate Change Health Policy Group in BC and contributor to the PCIC Plan2Adapt health module.

We hope that you can make it, either in person or by accessing our webcast.

Nastenka Calle
SFU Program Coordinator, PICS
n_calle@sfu.ca | www.sfu.ca/climatechange | www.PICS.uvic.ca

Sara Muir-Owen
UBC Program Coordinator, PICS
sara.muir-owen@ubc.ca | www.sustain.ubc.ca/pics |  www.PICS.uvic.ca