William Nierenberg

William Aaron Nierenberg (February 13, 1919 – September 10, 2000) was an American physicist who worked on the Manhattan Project and was director of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography from 1965 through 1986.^[1] He was a co-founder of the George C. Marshall Institute in 1984.

Background

Nierenberg was born on February 13, 1919, at 213 E. 13th Street, on the

In 1948, Nierenberg took up his first academic staff position, as Assistant Professor of Physics at the University of Michigan. From 1950 to 1965, he was Associate and then Professor of Physics at the University of California, Berkeley, where he had a very large and productive low energy nuclear physics laboratory, graduating 40 PhD’s during this time and publishing about 100 papers. He was responsible for the determination of more nuclear moments than any other single individual. This work was cited when he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1971.^[4]

During this period, in 1953, Nierenberg took a one-year leave to serve as the director of the

In 1965, Nierenberg was asked to be director of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO). Nierenberg was director of SIO for 21 years, the longest serving director to date. During his tenure, five modern research vessels joined the Scripps fleet and the institution’s budget increased fivefold.^[4] He oversaw the Deep Sea Drilling Project (1966–1986), which produced scientific advances such as the discovery of deep-sea hydrocarbons, the finding that the Mediterranean Sea had once been a closed basin and even a dry seabed, and confirmation that present ocean basins are young. The project became the first multi-institutional, international collaboration in science and a model for later projects.^[4]

Nierenberg gained national recognition for his contributions to science. He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1971 and to the governing Council of the Academy in 1979. He was also elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1965,^[5] the American Philosophical Society in 1975,^[6] and the National Academy of Engineering in 1983.^[7] In 1981, Nierenberg became a founding member of the World Cultural Council.^[8] In 1987, he was awarded the Delmer S. Fahrney Medal from the Franklin Institute for outstanding leadership in science.^[9]

Advisory boards

Nierenberg served on a large number of panels and advisory committees, primarily after he returned from NATO. In 1971 he was appointed chairman of the National Academy of Sciences National Advisory Committee on Oceans and Atmosphere and served on this committee until 1977. He served on various panels of the President's Science Advisory Committee. He was a member of the National Science Board from 1972 to 1978 and was appointed for another term from November 1982 to May 1988.^[10]

Nierenberg was a consultant to the

• The most probable date of CO₂ "doubling" (to 600 ppm) was 2065 (page 21)
• Global warming due to doubling CO₂ is likely to be between 1.5 – 4.5 °C, as suggested by the
  Charney report
  . Careful review of dissenting inferences suggesting negligible CO₂-induced climate change shows these to be based on misleading analysis (page 28)
• Warming at equilibrium would be 2-3 times as great over the polar regions as over the tropics; and probably greater over the arctic (page 30)
• Sea level might rise 70 cm over a century from thermal expansion, and melting of alpine glaciers. There was great uncertainty of the fate of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet; disintegration could lead to sea-level rise of 5 to 6 m over several hundred years (page 42)

The report also contained policy recommendations:

• CO₂ is a cause for concern but not panic; a program of action without a program for learning would be costly and ineffective (page 61)
• A careful, well-designed program of monitoring and analysis is needed to detect the CO₂ signal on climate (page 76)

The policy recommendations have proved controversial, and it decelerated calls for quick action on climate change in the media and Washington.

Marshall Institute

Nierenberg subsequently became a co-founder of the George C. Marshall Institute,^[17] and a critic of some of the scientific research papers disputing the role of human produced Co2 emissions in climate change.

Legacy

A building and a rose garden on the campus of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography are named for him, and the

• Merchants of Doubt
• Nierenberg Prize

Notes