Climate change is arguably one of the most politically divisive and economically consequential issue of our time. Anyone seeking an accurate assessment of the risks that human industry poses to our planet is often confronted with the extremes of climate change denial on the one hand, and overdrawn apocalyptic scenarios on the other. The frequent claim by proponents of the latter view—that there is no dissensus among scientists on this topic—is neither helpful nor representative of how scientific research and debate actually operate. Moreover, in its latest report, the IPCC’s (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) subcommittee Scenario MIP has eliminated the most extreme scenarios that have dominated climate research for the last few decades. (See here for a brief report by the New York Times).
The Houston Centre invites you to a public discussion of a nuanced approach to global warming and climate change policies with a public lecture by Dr. Ross McKitrick (University of Guelph), Professor of Economics and expert on the economic impact of climate change policies. McKitrick will argue against climate change deniers that the threat from global warming is not zero. Still, he also believes that the risk of global warming has been overstated in several ways, and that most of the policies we continue to pursue to mitigate the effects of global warming are doing more harm than good.
Dr. McKitrick’s lecture will be followed by a substantive (30 minute) response offered by Dr. Jonathan Proctor (UBC).
About the Speakers
Ross McKitrick
Ross McKitrick is a Professor of Economics at the University of Guelph where he specializes in environmental economics and climate change. He has published widely on environmental economics, climate econometrics and energy policy. His academic research has appeared in top economics and climate science journals and his book Economic Analysis of Environmental Policy was published by the University of Toronto Press in 2010. His background in applied statistics has also led him to collaborative work across a wide range of topics in the physical sciences including climate change attribution, paleoclimate reconstruction, malaria transmission, surface temperature measurement and climate model evaluation. Professor McKitrick has made many invited academic presentations around the world, and has testified before the US Congress and committees of the Canadian House of Commons and Senate.
For more information about this speaker, see
Jonathan Proctor
Dr. Proctor currently works as assistant professor in Food and Resource Economics at the University of British Columbia. Before starting at UBC, after receiving his PhD in Agriculture and Resource Economics from UC Berkeley in 2019, He was a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard with the Data Science Initiative and the Center for the Environment.
Dr. Proctor’s research group develops and applies new methods to empirically estimate anthropogenic impacts on climate and, in turn, on global socio-environmental systems. He focusses in particular on how light, water, and temperature jointly determine crop growth and how high resolution imagery can be used to measure socio-environmental conditions. His research uses tools from economics, agronomy, climate science, remote sensing, and machine learning to help answer policy-relevant questions. For more information, see https://www.jonathanproctor.org/