Dr Thomas E. Downing is Affiliated Senior Research Fellow at SEI Oxford, President and CEO of the Global Climate Adaptation Partnership and Visiting Professor, University of Oxford.

He has been Executive Director of SEI Oxford, MunichRe Foundation Chair in social vulnerability with the United Nations University Institute for Environment and Human Security, Reader in the Environmental Change Institute, University of Oxford, founding director of the UK Climate Impacts Programme, expert advisor to the UK House of Commons, and chair of the International Geographical Union's Task Force on Vulnerability.

He also contributes to the technical steering committee of the Global Adaptation Network with the United Nations Environment Programme.

He is a leading expert on climate vulnerability and natural hazards, adaptation and food security, drawing upon 30 years of professional work.

His PhD at Clark University was based on four years in Kenya, as an advisor to the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources, and engagement that was reflected in work on the economics of climate change in East Africa and a briefing to cabinet in 2009 (see the SEI Annual Report for 2009). 

He has contributed to all four of the assessments of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and is Review Editor for the fifth assessment now underway.  He has contributed to many EC research projects, at present coordinating ClimateCost with Paull Watkiss and a major role in Mediation (with Paul and Sukaina Bharwani).

Through the Global Climate Adaptation Partnership he leads mainstreaming climate adaptation in the African Development Bank and a consortium organising to gear up the Adaptation Academy (led by Mohamed Hamza); both efforts involve collaborative projects with SEI Oxford.

He is author of over 100 journal articles, book chapters and technical papers. The third edition of the Atlas of Climate Change (with Kirstin Dow) is due out in Spring 2011, a graphical treatment of the climate story from early warning signs to practical action published in eight languages.

Publications

• Adaptation Strategies for the Mediterranean (Book chapter - 2013)

• Extreme Outcomes: Prospects for major tipping and socially contingent events and associated economic and social costs (Policy brief - 2012)

• Balancing groundwater conservation and rural livelihoods under water and climate uncertainties: An integrated hydro-economic modeling framework (Journal article - 2011)

• Learning to adapt (Book chapter - 2010)

• What can social science tell us about meeting the challenge of climate change? (Book chapter - 2010)

• An introduction to analysing dynamic vulnerability (Book chapter - 2010)

• AdaptCost Project: Analysis of the Economic Costs of Climate Change Adaptation in Africa (Report - 2010)

• Economics of Climate Change Kenya (Project report - 2009)

• Economics of Climate Change in Rwanda (Report - 2009)

• Les technologies de l'information et de la communication au service de l'adaptation (Journal article - 2009)

Complete list of publications »

Projects

• Mediation

  
  

• AdaptCost

  
  

• The Climate Change, Environment and Migration Alliance (CCEMA)

  
  

• Economics of Climate Change in East Africa

  
  

• ClimateCost - The Full Costs of Climate Change

  
  

• GEO-4: Environment for Development Vulnerability of people and the environment: challenges and opportunities

  
  

• Climate Change and Impact Research: the Mediterranean Environment (CIRCE)

  
  

• Climate Change Adaptation Targets (CCAT)

  
  

• Agent-Based Modeling for Water Resources Planning

  
  

• weADAPT

  
  

• NeWater: New approaches to adaptive water management under uncertainty

  
  

• The Netherlands Climate Assistance Programme (NCAP)