Kistler Book Award winner

The Bellevue-based Foundation For the Future has selected climatologist David Archer, Ph.D., to receive the Walter P. Kistler Book Award for 2009. Dr. Archer is the seventh recipient of the award, which was established in 2003 to recognize authors of science-based books that significantly increase the public’s knowledge and understanding about subjects that will shape the future.

Archer is being honored for his book The Long Thaw: How Humans Are Changing the Next 100,000 Years of Earth’s Climate, published by Princeton University Press in 2008.

Archer has been a Professor of geophysical sciences at the University of Chicago since 1993, teaching classes on global warming, environmental chemistry, and geochemistry. He previously wrote a textbook for non-science-major undergraduates entitled Global Warming: Understanding the Forecast (2006) and is a frequent contributor to the weblog RealClimate.org.

A book for lay readers, The Long Thaw puts the global warming climate event into the context of geologic time in the past and the future.

“If you’ve heard that the lifetime of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is only a 100-year phenomenon that we need not be too concerned about, you should spend some time with the book,” said Sesh Velamoor, Foundation Trustee and Director of Programs. “David Archer explains the geophysical details of what global warming means, down to the impact of burning a single gallon of gasoline.”

The Walter P. Kistler Award includes a cash prize of $10,000 and a certificate. It is named for the originator of the award and benefactor of the Foundation For the Future.

Kistler will formally present the award to Dr. David Archer on April 16 at Kane Hall in Seattle. The event is open to the public without charge. Seating is limited.

Anyone wishing to attend the April 16 event may come to Kane Hall (Room 130), located on the University of Washington campus, at 7 p.m.

Following introductions, the award presentation, and a short lecture, Dr. Archer will be interviewed live on stage on the themes of climate change, the long lifetime of CO2 in the atmosphere, and what humans could do to stop the effects of global warming. At the conclusion of the interview, he will take questions from the audience.

Copies of The Long Thaw will be available for purchase at the event for signing by Dr. Archer.