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Desert Island Discs

Professor Corinne Le Quéré, climate scientist

Desert Island Discs

BBC

Society & Culture, Music Commentary, Music, Personal Journals

4.413.7K Ratings

🗓️ 26 February 2023

⏱️ 37 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Corinne Le Quéré is the Royal Society Research Professor of Climate Change Science at the University of East Anglia where she studies the way marine ecosystems respond to climate change. She uses computer simulators of the ocean to assess how the carbon cycle functions and her climate models have resulted in significant findings about how warmer temperatures have affected the ocean’s ability to absorb carbon. Corinne was born in Quebec and as a child spent camping holidays in the national parks of Eastern Canada which fostered her interest in the natural world. She studied physics at the University of Montréal and then took a Masters in Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences. Her love of oceanography began with a desire to uncover the mysteries that lie beneath the waves. In 2007, while she was working with UEA and the British Antarctic Survey, she published her landmark paper which demonstrated that human activity reduced the Southern Ocean’s capacity to absorb atmospheric carbon dioxide. Corinne advises the UK Committee on Climate Change and served on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) when it won the Nobel Prize in 2007. She was appointed a CBE in 2019. Corinne lives with her husband in Norfolk where she hopes one day to buy a piece of land and plant a forest which will play a central part in her personal plan to achieve carbon neutrality. DISC ONE: La Vida Es Un Carnaval by Celia Cruz DISC TWO: Les copains d’abord by Georges Brassens DISC THREE: We are the Champions by Queen DISC FOUR: Harmonie du soir à Chateauguay by Beau Dommage DISC FIVE: Proud Mary (Live) by Tina Turner DISC SIX: Die Zauberflöte, K. 620, Act 2: "Der Hölle Rache (Konigin der Nacht)" (Queen of Night) composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, performed by Bernard Haitink, Edita Gruberová, Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks DISC SEVEN: LDN by Lily Allen DISC EIGHT: Three-Part Inventions: Sinfonia 15 BWV 801, composed by Johann Sebastian Bach, performed by Martin Stadtfeld BOOK CHOICE: World Atlas of the Oceans by Dave Monahan LUXURY ITEM: A mask and snorkel CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: La Vida Es Un Carnaval by Celia Cruz Presenter Lauren Laverne Producer Paula McGinley

Transcript

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0:00.0

BBC Sounds Music Radio Podcasts

0:04.9

Hello, I'm Lauren LeVern and this is the Desert Island Disks Podcast.

0:08.6

Every week I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks, book and luxury they'd want to take with them

0:13.9

if they were cast away to a desert island.

0:16.4

And for right reasons, the music is shorter than the original broadcast.

0:21.2

I hope you enjoy listening.

0:45.6

My cast away this week is Professor Corinne Lukare.

0:48.8

She's an oceanographer and professor of climate change science at the University of East Anglia,

0:53.6

where she works on the interaction between the natural carbon cycle and climate change.

0:58.4

In 2007, she experienced what she has called her moment of infamy.

1:03.4

She discovered that the southern ocean, the vast body of waters surrounding Antarctica,

1:07.8

was not processing CO2 the way the scientific community believed.

1:12.0

In fact, she revealed climate change was damaging its ability to absorb carbon from the atmosphere.

1:17.9

She founded the Global Carbon Budget, which keeps track of where carbon is being released and absorbed,

1:23.9

and advises the UK committee on climate change, but it almost didn't happen this way.

1:28.8

Growing up in Quebec, she wanted to study sports science, only to find she missed the window to apply

1:34.3

by 24 hours. So she settled on her second favourite subject, physics.

1:39.8

She says, I refuse to let myself be dragged into the emotion of climate doomism.

1:44.5

If you go there, you can't really work in this field anymore. Professor Corinne Lukare,

1:49.7

welcome to Desert Island Discs. Thank you. So Corinne, the statistics about climate change

1:54.9

make for pretty grim reading, how do you stop yourself being dragged into what you call climate doomism?

2:00.9

I try to be as much as possible in touch with nature. I like the weather, so just looking out the

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