Rajendra Pachauri

Dr. Rajendra Kumar Pachauri is the chair of the Nobel Peace Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the scientific intergovernmental body that provides decision makers and the public with an objective source of information about climate change. He is also director general of TERI (The Energy and Resources Institute), a major independent research organization providing knowledge on energy, environment, forestry, biotechnology, and the conservation of natural resources.

Dr. Pachauri is a prominent researcher on environmental subjects, recognized internationally for his efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change. Since July 2009 he has also been director of Yale Climate and Energy Institute.

He is active in several international forums dealing with the subject of climate change and its policy dimensions. He was awarded the second-highest civilian award in India, the Padma Vibhushan, in January 2008 by the President of India, and received the Officier de la Légion D'Honneur, from the Government of France in 2006. He has been conferred with The Order of the Rising Sun, Gold and Silver Star by His Majesty Akihito, Emperor of Japan, the Commander of the Order of the White Rose of Finland by the Prime Minister of Finland, and the Commander of the Order of Leopold II by the King of the Belgians.