Congratulations to RCEI affiliate Dr. Bob Kopp, who has been selected for the American Geophysical Union’s 2026 Ambassador Award! This award honors scientists whose work has had outstanding societal impact and who have shown exceptional leadership in connecting science with the public and with policy.
Kopp is a fitting recipient of this prestigious award, as his research has transformed how communities understand and plan for sea-level rise. His team demonstrated that twentieth-century global sea-level rise was faster than in any century for at least four millennia, and pioneered the probabilistic global and regional projections now used by coastal planners worldwide.
His science-policy work spans every scale. He co-led the development of Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) AR6 sea-level projections and is a Lead Author for Working Group 1 in AR7; has served in multiple National Academies leadership roles and contributed to several US National Climate Assessments; and chaired three New Jersey sea-level rise assessments that underpin the state’s coastal regulatory rules. Over the past year he has also stepped up to defend climate science under political pressure, including helping RCEI affiliate Pamela McElwee co-found the US Academic Alliance for the IPCC, which has kept more than 80 US authors engaged in AR7, and co-organizing, with Andrew Dessler of Texas A&M, a rapid expert rebuttal by more than 85 climate scientists of the Department of Energy Climate Working Group report in response to federal rule changes to overturn EPA’s endangerment finding.
At Rutgers, Kopp leads the NSF-funded Megalopolitan Coastal Transformation Hub (MACH), founded the Coastal Climate Risk and Resilience (C2R2) graduate certificate, co-chaired the committee that drafted the University’s Climate Action Plan, and has mentored a generation of interdisciplinary climate scholars.
McElwee was “delighted to nominate Bob for this honor and could not be happier to see his contributions recognized.” She calls on fellow colleagues to “Please join me in congratulating him!”
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