Dankesrede – Rom, 21.11.2008 (englisch)

USA

Wallace Broecker

Balzan Preis 2008 für Klima-Wissenschaft: Klimawandel

Wallace Broecker hat mit seinen Entdeckungen über die Interaktion der Meere mit der Atmosphäre, über die Rolle der Veränderungen der Gletscher und über die Bedeutung der in Eisproben und in Meeres-Ablagerungen enthaltenen Informationen auf herausragende Weise zum Verständnis des Klimawandels beigetragen. Die Erkenntnisse Broeckers sind für das Verständnis nicht nur der abrupten, sondern auch der graduellen Klimaveränderungen von enormer Bedeutung.

Mr. President,
Members of the Balzan Foundation,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

I was pleasantly surprised to receive a telephone call at 8:40am one morning from Professor Enric Banda in Barcelona informing me that I was to receive the Balzan Prize. While I was aware that two of my friends, Wolf Berger and the late Harmon Craig had received this award, it had never occurred to me that I would join them as a recipient of this great honor. Nor did I realize how large its monetary value.

As I live as a widower fairly simply and as a year ago I received the Crafoord Award, my immediate thought was that I should donate much of the prize to a worthy cause. But what cause? Then it occurred to me that it was an opportunity to pay back a bit for all the wonderful things the late Gary Comer had done for my field (abrupt climate change), for my institution (Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory) and for me personally.

Hence I have decided to accept personally only ten percent of the award and to donate the other ninety percent to the Comer Science and Education Foundation. The foundation’s executive officer has to this end created a separate fund named the Global Climate Research Foundation to house this donation. It will be spent for small research grants focused on several key areas that I deem important to our understanding of the consequence of the ongoing global warming created by the release of CO2 generated by the burning of fossil fuels.

In conclusion, I would like to express my sincere thanks to members of the General Prize Committee and to the Balzan Foundation for bestowing on me this great honor.