UK Climate Resilience programme champions

August 2019

UKRI and Met Office are pleased to announce that Professor Suraje Dessai and Dr Kate Lonsdale, based at the University of Leeds, have been appointed to be the Champions for the UK Climate Resilience Programme.  As thought leaders for the programme, the Champions play a number of roles on behalf of the  programme, working with UKRI and Met Office communities; identifying research gaps, shaping research calls, synthesis, exchange and application of research outputs, facilitating links across the research and user communities (including business, policy, third sector) and ensuring links into related national and international efforts. 

Suraje Dessai has been Professor of Climate Change Adaptation at the University of Leeds since 2012. His research and teaching focuses on the management of climate change uncertainties, perception of climate risks and the science-policy interface in climate change impacts, adaptation and services. He has published more than 80 peer-reviewed papers and was the recipient of a European Research Council Starting Grant. He is the co-editor-in-chief of Climate Risk Management and a Lead Author in the IPCC WG1 (The Physical Science Basis) Sixth Assessment Report, having been a Lead Author in the IPCC WG2 (Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability) Fifth Assessment Report.

Kate has worked on adaptation to a changing climate as a researcher, trainer, facilitator, and evaluator and in an advisory capacity for over 24 years in both developed and developing country contexts.  She has led and managed projects in a range of settings including civil society, academia and policy and within organizations that aim to create a bridge between these different sectors.  Kate also has 15 years of experience in designing and facilitating participatory research processes, workshops and events.

The Champions will work alongside the Met Office delivery team to ensure good coordination with the Met Office research activities.  The Met Office delivery team is led by Professor Jason Lowe, from the Met Office and University of Leeds, a specialist in using climate science to produce evidence to support both Mitigation and Adaptation. Recently, he led the production of the latest UK climate projections, UKCP18, and is scientific Coordinator of the EU H2020 programme, EUCP. 

The four year £18.6 million programme will enhance the UK’s resilience to climate variability and change through frontier interdisciplinary research and innovation on climate risk, adaptation and services, working with stakeholders and end-users to ensure the research is useful and usable.

The objectives of the programme are:
1.    Characterising and quantifying climate-related risks.
2.    Managing climate-related risks through adaptation. 
3.    Co-producing climate services.

The programme is led by UKRI (led by NERC) and the Met Office, with the Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), the Economic & Social Research Council (ESRC) and the Arts & Humanities Research Council (AHRC), and will be delivered through a combination of open calls and directly commissioned research. 

Contact: The UK Climate Resilience Champions: [email protected]