Benefactors Put UCI in Global Spotlight : Donation Will Help Lay Groundwork for Future International Atmospheric Pacts

As a young campus in the University of California system, UC Irvine has grown up with the concerns about air quality that have accompanied Southern California’s relentless sprawl. Now, thanks to a $1-million contribution by longtime benefactors Joan Irvine Smith and her mother, Athalie R. Clarke, the university is poised to fill a leadership role in atmospheric research.

UC Irvine already has a share of international acclaim in research on global warming.

The key players are its two top atmospheric scientists, F. Sherwood Rowland, who with a fellow researcher discovered in 1974 that man-made chemicals were destroying the ozone layer, and noted geophysicist Ralph J. Cicerone.

The goal is to bring in postdoctoral fellows and visiting researchers from other countries to compare notes and lay the groundwork for future international agreements.

The timing couldn’t be better.

Growing international concern about the accumulation of so-called greenhouse gases found expression at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro this summer. Also apparent was the U.S. government’s stubborn unwillingness to commit to reductions of carbon dioxide emissions.

In fact, as Rowland observes, the interaction of scientists from around the world is needed now especially, in part because regional assessments of global atmospheric conditions have a tendency to differ.

It will be important in the future for political leaders and public policy advisers to have the benefit of pooled information about environmental conditions.

The recession and the political year have turned up some of the rhetoric between environmentalists and development interests.

Irvine’s enhanced research capacity will be one very good resource for bringing some of the rarefied debate down to Earth.