The Center for Global Sustainability (CGS) and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory's Joint Global Change Research Institute (JGCRI) with the University of Maryland have a long-standing partnership that regularly churns out critical analyses and reports. A key facet of this partnership is the joint appointees between the two institutions that produce collaborative research and discussions. The CGS and JGCRI joint appointees grow the research portfolios of both organizations with in-depth, multi-team analyses, sparking important dialogue on climate policies.
CGS is glad to welcome five new joint appointees that will conduct research with CGS and strengthen our research and academic partnership with JGCRI.
Bio: Steven J. Smith is a Joint Appointee between the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory's Joint Global Change Research Institute and the University of Maryland in College Park, MD. Smith’s research has focused on long-term socioeconomic scenarios, the interface between socioeconomic systems and the climate system, and interactions between air pollution and climate. Smith works with the Global Change Analysis Model (GCAM), which he and his collaborators are using to examine multi-sector interactions between the energy system, greenhouse gas, and air pollutant emissions from global to regional scales. Smith also contributes to national and international assessment activities, including the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
CGS Projects
- Supporting Global and National Methane Strategies: Through our research and methane projects, CGS is contributing to the new global focus on methane reductions to enable keeping 1.5C warming within reach.
- State of Maryland: CGS has been tasked by the State of Maryland, through the Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE), to help the State understand pathways to achieve its highly ambitious climate targets embedded in the Climate Solutions Now Act of 2022 (CSNA).
Yang Ou
Bio: Dr. Yang Ou is an Earth Scientist at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. Yang's research spans across energy system modeling, greenhouse gas mitigation, air pollution control, and climate policy analysis from global to sub-national scales. Yang is also a developer of the Global Change Analysis Model (GCAM) and GCAM-USA. His research has been published in Science, Nature Climate Change, Nature Communications, and PNAS.
CGS Projects
- America Is All In: As a core organization of the All In analytical team, CGS produces analyses that assess how all-of-society climate strategies that leverage the leadership of states, cities, regions, provinces, businesses, investors, and other actors can create robust and ambitious outcomes.
Zarrar Khan
Bio: Dr. Zarrar Khan is a computational scientist at the Joint Global Change Research Institute (JGCRI) at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). His research involves modeling and analyzing global interconnected human and earth systems with a focus on developing tools and methodologies to promote stakeholder engagement and facilitating the analysis of global modeling outputs in the context of local issues. His recent work focuses on the analysis and visualization of global modeling outputs at finer decision-relevant spatial and temporal scales.
CGS Projects
- Analytics for Global Climate Ambition: This CGS program integrates of broad and diverse non-state actions and ambition to enhance national planning is an essential component of raising ambition globally. Our work at CGS builds a model integrating engagement, analysis, and multi-level governance that can provide the driving force for enhanced ambition.
Bio: Matthew Binsted is an Earth Scientist at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory’s (PNNL) Joint Global Change Research Institute (JGCRI) in College Park, MD. His research focuses on integrated modeling and analysis of economic, energy, and environmental systems, exploring technology, policy, and market interactions under long-term transitions, both globally and within the USA. Specific studies have explored deep decarbonization pathways, hydropower expansion, electric power systems modeling, subnational energy-water-land dynamics, and model harmonization and validation. He has authored or co-authored more than 20 peer-reviewed publications, including in high-impact journals such as Science, Nature Climate Change, Nature Energy, and Joule.
CGS Projects
- Analysis through Global Climate Analysis Model (GCAM) - USA: Binstead is a core member of CGS’s GCAM-USA team. He is co-leading GCAM-USA participation in several multi-model projects, including the Energy Modeling Forum 37 and ENGAGE.
Michael Westphal
Bio: Dr. Michael I. Westphal is a Research Scientist at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, based at the Joint Global Change Research Institute in Maryland, and an Adjunct Professor at the McCourt School of Public Policy at Georgetown University, where he teaches climate policy. Dr. Westphal has worked on climate change for 20 years across climate change mitigation, adaptation, finance, and economics for international organizations, NGOs, the US Government, and the private sector. His current research is focused on climate and energy policy analysis, integrated assessment modeling (Global Change Analysis Model), and net-zero modeling pathways across several countries, including Argentina, Malaysia, Thailand, and Ukraine. He recently served as a contributing author for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Sixth Assessment Report (Working Group III, urban systems and other settlements).
CGS Projects
- Network for Greening the Financial System (NGFS): CGS researchers are working with a consortium of integrated assessment modeling teams to support NGFS. They produce scenarios using the GCAM model and explore the macroeconomic impacts of climate change and climate change mitigation on economic output.
Stay tuned to hear more about the great work of our Joint Appointees at CGS.
