Legendary climate scientist John Houghton dies at 88

ANKARA- Anadolu Agency

Sir John Theodore Houghton, a prominent British atmospheric physicist and climate scientist, and co-chair of the Nobel Peace Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), died on April 15 in the U.K, from a suspected case of coronavirus.

"We are sorry to have to announce that Sir John Houghton, the President of JRI, and our founding father, died yesterday (15th April 2020) in Wales. More details will follow. Pray for Sir John's family at this difficult time," the JRI Christian science educational charity said on Twitter.

Houghton’s granddaughter, Hannah Malcolm, shared information about his life where she described him as a person "who devoted his career to climate justice, including chairing the IPCC and changing the mind of a major U.S. evangelical lobbyist."

Houghton was a professor in atmospheric physics at the University of Oxford, former director-general at the U.K.'s Met Office and founder of the Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research.

He was born Dec. 30, 1931, in Dyserth village, Denbighshire in northeast Wales.

His interest in science, appeared when he started Rhyl Grammar School (Rhyl High School) where his father was a teacher and continued at Jesus College, Oxford at the age of 16, where he earned a B.A. in 1951, M.A in 1955, and Ph.D in 1955.

During his career in climate and science, he authored Global Warming, the Complete Briefing, which was among his famous writings that included IPCC findings and guides to climate change.

Houghton defined global warming as a "weapon of mass destruction" since it kills more people than terrorism. "Our long-term security is threatened by a problem at least as dangerous as chemical, nuclear or biological weapons, or
indeed international terrorism: human-induced climate change."

He became a professor at Oxford in 1958 that led to setting up the Global Atmospheric Research Program in the late 1960s.

In the 1980s he was the chairman of the Joint Scientific Committee of the World Climate Research Program. He was designated director-general of the U.K. Meteorological Office in 1983 until 1991.

In 1988 was the year the first IPCC was created and Houghton was also co-chair of its scientific assessment working group until 2002. He was lead editor of the first three IPCC reports.

He was an honorary scientist of the Hadley Centre from 2002, honorary scientist at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory since 1991, a trustee of the Shell Foundation from 2000 and chairman of the John Ray Initiative from 1997 until his death.

Houghton also an advisory board member for Sure Chill Technology in 2013.