The Oxford Net Zero initiative draws on the University’s world-leading expertise in climate science and policy, addressing the critical issue of how to reach global ‘net zero’ – limiting greenhouse gases – in time to halt global warming.
Leading academics from across the University’s disciplines, including Geography, Physics, Economics, Biology, Law and Earth Sciences, will come together to focus on the long-term questions necessary to achieve equitable, science-based solutions.
The team will be led by research director Professor Sam Fankhauser, who is joining Oxford from his current position as director of the LSE’s Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, and director Professor Myles Allen, physicist and head of the Climate Research Programme in Oxford’s Environmental Change Institute. The SRF investment will create four new senior research fellow positions and bring together a cohort of a further 9 research fellows from across the University who will lead the building of a vibrant research community in this critical area.
Professor Patrick Grant, Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research, says: ‘Oxford Net Zero brings together our research in how to effectively realise the carbon transition, involving many departments and different disciplinary perspectives. We anticipate that more researchers and external stakeholders will become engaged in the programme, strengthening the impact of the ideas and insights that our researchers can provide.’
Essential questions that Oxford Net Zero will address include:
- How will carbon dioxide be distributed between the atmosphere, oceans, biosphere and lithosphere?
- Where will it be stored, in what forms, how stable will these storage pools be, who will own them and be responsible for maintaining them over the short medium and long terms?
- How does net zero policy extend to other greenhouse gases?
- How will the social licence to generate, emit, capture, transport, and store carbon dioxide evolve over the coming century?
Investment from the Strategic Research Fund: £2.2 million
