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Improving Characterization of Anthropogenic Methane Emissions in the United States (2018)

Chapter: Appendix G: Biographical Sketches of Committee Members

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Suggested Citation:"Appendix G: Biographical Sketches of Committee Members." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2018. Improving Characterization of Anthropogenic Methane Emissions in the United States. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/24987.
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APPENDIX G

Biographical Sketches of Committee Members

James W. C. White (Chair) is interim dean of the College of Arts & Sciences and a professor of geological sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder. He is a climate scientist with experience working with ice cores from Greenland and Antarctica. His areas of focus are global change, paleoclimate dynamics, and biogeochemistry, and his specific interests include global-scale climate and environmental dynamics; carbon dioxide concentrations and climate from stable hydrogen isotopes, peats, and other organics; climate from deuterium excess and hydrogen isotopes in ice cores; isotopes in general circulation models; and modern carbon cycle dynamics via isotopes of carbon dioxide and methane. Dr. White received his Ph.D. from Columbia University. He has participated in numerous National Research Council study committees, including chairing the Committee on Understanding and Monitoring Abrupt Climate Change and Its Impacts, and recently completed a term as chair of the Polar Research Board.

David Allen is the Gertz Regents Professor of Chemical Engineering, and the director of the Center for Energy and Environmental Resources, at the University of Texas at Austin. He is the author of seven books and over 250 papers, primarily in the areas of urban air quality, the engineering of sustainable systems, and the development of materials for environmental and engineering education. Dr. Allen has been a lead investigator for multiple air quality measurement studies, which have had a substantial impact on the direction of air quality policies. He directs the Air Quality Research Program for the State of Texas, and he is the founding editor-in-chief of the American Chemical Society’s journal ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering. The quality of his work has been recognized by the National Science Foundation, the AT&T Foundation, the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, the Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors, and the State of Texas. In 2017, he was elected to the National Academy of Engineering. He has served on a variety of governmental advisory panels and from 2012 to 2015 chaired the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Science Advisory Board. Dr. Allen received his B.S. degree in chemical engineering, with distinction, from Cornell University in 1979. His M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in chemical engineering were awarded by the California Institute of Technology in 1981 and 1983. He has held visiting faculty appointments at the California Institute of Technology, the University of California, Santa Barbara, and the U.S. Department of Energy.

Suggested Citation:"Appendix G: Biographical Sketches of Committee Members." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2018. Improving Characterization of Anthropogenic Methane Emissions in the United States. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/24987.
×

Praveen K. Amar is an independent consultant working in the areas of environment (air), energy, and climate change strategies. He recently served as a member of the Technical Experts Group for the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) that developed UN-written guidelines on best available technologies and best engineering practices for mercury control from industrial sources. These guidelines were required under the UN global treaty known as the Minamata Convention. From May 2011 to May 2013, he was the senior policy advisor of technology and climate policy at the Clean Air Task Force, an environmental organization with a focus on protecting the environment through research, advocacy, collaboration, and innovation. From 2007 to 2011, he served as a member of U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC) panel on review of Secondary National Ambient Air Quality Standards for SO2 and NOx. Since 2015, he has been serving on the reconstituted CASAC review panel on the same subject. He recently completed his service on the EPA’s Clean Air Act Advisory Committee Climate Change Work Group that addressed approaches the EPA may take to control greenhouse gas emissions from large industrial sources. He served as a member of the National Academies Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology from 2010 to 2016, and as a member of the National Academies Committee on Scientific Tools and Approaches for Sustainability for use in the EPA’s decision making. He is currently serving on the National Academies’ Committee on the Review of Environmental Protection Agency’s Science to Achieve Results’ Research Grants Program. He received his Ph.D. in engineering from the University of California, Los Angeles, and is a registered professional engineer in California.

Jean Bogner is research professor emerita at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC), Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences. Previously she worked more than 20 years at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) focusing on applied geochemical research for mined land reclamation, groundwater remediation, and the recovery and utilization of landfill biogas. Subsequent U.S. and international projects at ANL, her consultancy Landfills +, Inc. (1997-2013), and UIC have focused on fundamental field and laboratory investigations related to landfill CH4 generation, transport, soil oxidation, and emissions. Recent publications focus on field-validated modeling for site-specific landfill CH4 emissions inclusive of local soils and climate, spatial and temporal variability of emissions, and alternative emission measurement strategies. During 2004-2007 she was the coordinating lead author for the “Waste Management” chapter of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 4th Assessment Report for Working Group III (“Mitigation of Climate Change”). She holds B.A., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees in geoscience, focusing on hydrogeology, geochemistry, and soils.

Suggested Citation:"Appendix G: Biographical Sketches of Committee Members." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2018. Improving Characterization of Anthropogenic Methane Emissions in the United States. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/24987.
×

Lori Bruhwiler is a physical scientist in the Global Monitoring Division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Earth Systems Research Laboratory (ESRL) in Boulder, Colorado. Dr. Bruhwiler received her Ph.D. and master’s of astrophysical, planetary, and atmospheric sciences from the University of Colorado in 1992 and 1988, respectively. Prior to her work at ESRL, Dr. Bruhwiler was a physical scientist for the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory in Princeton, New Jersey. Her research interests include understanding the budgets of CO2 and CH4 using atmospheric transport models, observations, and assimilation techniques.

Daniel Cooley is an associate professor in the Department of Statistics at Colorado State University. Dr. Cooley received his Ph.D. in applied mathematics from the University of Colorado at Boulder in 2005. Apart from being an associate professor, Dr. Cooley is also a faculty member at the Colorado State University School of Environmental Sustainability. Dr. Cooley’s research interests include extreme value theory, modeling multivariate extremes, heavy-tailed phenomena, spatial statistics, Bayesian modeling, and the meteorological/environmental and ecological applications of these. He has published many articles and has given several short courses on extremes. Dr. Cooley is currently chair of the American Statistical Association’s Advisory Committee on Climate Change Policy. In 2017, Dan was named a professor laureate of CSU’s College of Natural Sciences.

Christian Frankenberg is a scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory at California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, focusing on the remote sensing of atmospheric trace gases (with particular focus on greenhouse gases), biogeochemical cycles (through observations of greenhouse gases and chlorophyll fluorescence), hydrological cycle and distribution of water isotopes, inverse methods, and applied spectroscopy. Dr. Frankenerg received his Ph.D. in environmental physics from Ruprecht-Karls-University in Heidelberg, Germany, in 2005 where he was also a postdoctoral researcher. Dr. Frankenerg was also a VENI Postdoctoral Researcher (in conjunction with a personal fellowship from the Dutch Science Foundation) until December of 2009. Most recently he was awarded the NASA Early Career Achievement Medal and the Lew Allen Award for Excellence in 2012.

Fiji George is the director of Regulatory Policy at Southwestern Energy and has more than 23 years of experience related to energy−environmental and sustainability science and policy issues spanning natural gas production, processing, transmission, and liquid natural gas. His current focus is on characterizing methane emissions from the natural gas value chain through collaborative research and developing sound policies to meet the challenge of reducing methane emissions from the natural gas sector. He also focuses on identifying solutions for prudent natural gas development in a low-

Suggested Citation:"Appendix G: Biographical Sketches of Committee Members." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2018. Improving Characterization of Anthropogenic Methane Emissions in the United States. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/24987.
×

carbon economy, including assessing the impact of carbon budgets on oil and gas development. His experience includes leading the development of comprehensive methane emission inventories and protocols, development of methane measurement programs, and participation in scientific studies with academia, nongovernmental organizations, and other industry partners. He has been involved in several multistakeholder studies, including the 2010-2011 National Petroleum Council, the University of Texas studies on methane emissions from the production sector, the Stanford University–led Energy Modeling Forum, and methane studies in collaboration with the Colorado School of Mines, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. He holds a master’s in civil (environmental) engineering from Texas A&M University and a bachelor’s in mining engineering from Anna University, India.

Lisa Hanle is an independent consultant who has been active in the reporting and review of greenhouse gas (GHG) inventory information at the project, facility, national, and international levels for 19 years. Among other initiatives, she is currently serving as the director of the MRV Support Program at the Greenhouse Gas Management Institute, supporting developing countries in GHG inventory-related issues in the context of implementation of the Paris Agreement. Previously, she served as a Programme Officer at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Bonn, Germany, where she supported the international negotiations to develop the latest guidelines for reporting and review of GHG inventories under the Convention and the Kyoto Protocol, for use by developed countries. On a technical level, while at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, she supported development of the annual U.S. GHG inventory to the UNFCCC (responsible for generating emission estimates for industrial processes and fugitive emissions from coal, oil, and natural gas). Ms. Hanle was also a core member of the team that developed the United States’ first mandatory, facility-level GHG reporting program, and served as a lead author in the development of the 2006 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Guidelines for National Greenhouse Gas Inventories. She holds a master’s degree from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, where she focused on international economics with a concentration in energy, environment, science, and technology.

Alexander Hristov is a professor of dairy nutrition in the Department of Animal Science at The Pennsylvania State University and is a member of several professional societies and of the Feed Composition Committee of the National Animal Nutrition Program. He has a Ph.D. in animal nutrition from the Bulgarian Academy of Agricultural Sciences. Dr. Hristov is chair of the Network on Feed and Nutrition in Relation to Greenhouse Gas Emissions, which is an activity of the Livestock Research Group within the

Suggested Citation:"Appendix G: Biographical Sketches of Committee Members." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2018. Improving Characterization of Anthropogenic Methane Emissions in the United States. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/24987.
×

Global Research Alliance on Agricultural Greenhouse Gases. Dr. Hristov’s main research interests are in the areas of protein and amino acid nutrition of dairy cattle and mitigation of nutrient losses and gaseous emissions from cattle operations.

Ermias Kebreab is a professor of animal science and holds the Sesnon Endowed Chair in Sustainable Animal Agriculture at the Department of Animal Science, UC Davis. He is the deputy director of Agricultural Sustainability Institute and he was appointed associate vice provost at UC Davis Global Affairs in 2016 to advance the university’s engagement in international education. Dr. Kebreab conducts research on reducing the impact of animal agriculture on the environment, particularly greenhouse gas emissions. He has served on several national and international committees including those organized by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, and National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. He has mentored or hosted over 30 scholars in his laboratory, authored more than 200 peer-reviewed articles and 34 book chapters, and edited 5 books. Dr. Kebreab received several awards including the AFIA Ruminant Nutrition Award from the American Society of Animal Science. Dr. Kebreab received his B.Sc. degree from University of Asmara, Eritrea, and his M.Sc. and Ph.D. from University of Reading, United Kingdom.

April Leytem is a research scientist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Agricultural Research Service with the Northwest Irrigation and Soils Research Laboratory in Kimberly, Idaho. For the past 11 years she has been working in the area of on-farm emissions of ammonia and greenhouse gases from the livestock sector, including animal housing, manure storage, and land application of manures. Studies have focused on development of techniques for measuring/monitoring on-farm emissions and development of baseline emission factors. In particular, her focus has been on emissions from western dairy production systems. She was a contributing author for the USDA report, Quantifying Greenhouse Gas Fluxes in Agriculture and Forestry: Methods for Entity-Scale Inventory; in particular, she co-authored the chapter on “Quantifying Greenhouse Gas Sources and Sinks in Animal Production Systems.” In addition she has been involved in helping to improve whole-farm modeling efforts to estimate emissions from dairy production systems and efforts to quantify emissions for carbon credit applications.

Maria Mastalerz is a senior scientist with the Indiana Geological and Water Survey and adjunct associate professor with the Department of Geological Sciences, Indiana University, Bloomington. Dr. Mastalerz received her Ph.D. in mining geology from Silesian Technical University in Gliwice and her M.Sc. in geology from Wroclaw University, both in Poland. She did postdoctoral research at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada. Dr. Mastalerz’s area of expertise is coal geology and organic petrol-

Suggested Citation:"Appendix G: Biographical Sketches of Committee Members." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2018. Improving Characterization of Anthropogenic Methane Emissions in the United States. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/24987.
×

ogy and geochemistry of hydrocarbon source rocks. She has conducted research on coal and kerogen in sedimentary basins of Poland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the United States. She also has wide laboratory-oriented experience; she has developed and applied electron microprobe and reflectance micro-FTIR to study light element composition and functional group distributions in organic matter. Her current projects include characterization of Indiana Basin coals, investigation of coal-bed methane potential, and CO2 sorption into organic matter–rich formations, and oil and gas shale characterization. She has authored more than 200 papers related to fossil fuels published in peer-reviewed journals and is a recipient of national and international awards for her contributions to coal geology and organic petrology. Dr. Mastalerz serves as an associate editor of the International Journal of Coal Geology, and is an active member of American Association of Petroleum Geologists, Geological Society of America, International Committee for Coal and Organic Petrology, and the Society for Organic Petrology.

Steven Wofsy is the Abbott Lawrence Rotch Professor of Atmospheric and Environmental Science at Harvard University. His research emphasizes sources and distributions of greenhouse gases on urban, regional, and global scales and the impacts of climate change and land use on ecosystems and atmospheric composition. Dr. Wofsy’s extensive research interests include terrestrial carbon, effects of forests on climate, and climate in forests; inference of large-scale carbon budgets from atmospheric and land surface data; CO2 as a tracer of atmospheric transport in the upper troposphere and stratosphere; and new instrumentation for measuring atmospheric carbon cycle species (CO2, CO, and CH4). Dr. Wofsy has published over 300 journal articles during a career spanning four decades. His awards include the American Geophysical Union’s Macelwane prize and NASA’s Distinguished Public Service Medal. In 2011, he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences. He earned his B.S. in chemistry from the University of Chicago and his M.A. and Ph.D. in chemistry from Harvard University. He has served on the NASA Earth System Science and Applications Advisory and on the NASA Advisory Council as well as on the Carbon Cycle Science Plan Working Group and North American Carbon Program writing group. His recent National Research Council service includes the Committee on Indicators for Understanding Global Climate Change, the Panel on Atmosphere, the Committee on Methods for Estimating Greenhouse Gas Emissions, and the Committee on Ensuring the Utility and Integrity of Research Data in a Digital Age.

Suggested Citation:"Appendix G: Biographical Sketches of Committee Members." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2018. Improving Characterization of Anthropogenic Methane Emissions in the United States. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/24987.
×
Page 227
Suggested Citation:"Appendix G: Biographical Sketches of Committee Members." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2018. Improving Characterization of Anthropogenic Methane Emissions in the United States. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/24987.
×
Page 228
Suggested Citation:"Appendix G: Biographical Sketches of Committee Members." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2018. Improving Characterization of Anthropogenic Methane Emissions in the United States. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/24987.
×
Page 229
Suggested Citation:"Appendix G: Biographical Sketches of Committee Members." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2018. Improving Characterization of Anthropogenic Methane Emissions in the United States. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/24987.
×
Page 230
Suggested Citation:"Appendix G: Biographical Sketches of Committee Members." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2018. Improving Characterization of Anthropogenic Methane Emissions in the United States. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/24987.
×
Page 231
Suggested Citation:"Appendix G: Biographical Sketches of Committee Members." National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2018. Improving Characterization of Anthropogenic Methane Emissions in the United States. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/24987.
×
Page 232
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Understanding, quantifying, and tracking atmospheric methane and emissions is essential for addressing concerns and informing decisions that affect the climate, economy, and human health and safety. Atmospheric methane is a potent greenhouse gas (GHG) that contributes to global warming. While carbon dioxide is by far the dominant cause of the rise in global average temperatures, methane also plays a significant role because it absorbs more energy per unit mass than carbon dioxide does, giving it a disproportionately large effect on global radiative forcing. In addition to contributing to climate change, methane also affects human health as a precursor to ozone pollution in the lower atmosphere.

Improving Characterization of Anthropogenic Methane Emissions in the United States summarizes the current state of understanding of methane emissions sources and the measurement approaches and evaluates opportunities for methodological and inventory development improvements. This report will inform future research agendas of various U.S. agencies, including NOAA, the EPA, the DOE, NASA, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), and the National Science Foundation (NSF).

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