CEN - Center for Earth System Research and Sustainability
Centerfor Earth System Research and Sustainability (CEN)
New CEN Director: Prof. Dr. Grischa Perino“Thinking outside our own academic box”
10 January 2023, by Ute Kreis
Photo: UHH/CEN
The Center for Earth System Research and Sustainability (CEN) now has a new Director: effective January 1, Prof. Grischa Perino from the WiSo Faculty succeeded Prof. Detlef Stammer, who co-founded the CEN and had led it since 2011. “This year we have several important milestones on the agenda,” Perino explains. “A new research plan, the release of the second ‘Hamburg Climate Futures Outlook,’ not to mention the intensive work involved in the continued funding application for the Cluster of Excellence for climate research CLICCS – they’re all important aspects of setting our course, and I look forward to helping shape these exciting times.”
As a professor of economics, particularly ecological economics, Perino has been a member of the CEN for several years. His work focuses on environmental and climate policy, and on how climate protection measures interact with one another – e.g. European emissions trading and Germany’s phasing out of coal. Founded at the MIN Faculty, the CEN today stands as central research center of the university for an integrative approach combining the natural and social sciences: “It’s not just in climate change – in nearly all questions concerning the environment and resources, physical, chemical and biological processes are closely linked to societal choices. We’ll only find sustainable solutions by thinking outside our own academic box.”
Networking and trust-based collaboration are also important to him in his new position – in research, but also in his duties for the CEN Office and in scientific service and IT. “The key aspect is maintaining a good climate for innovative, creative ideas.”
Prof. Dr. Grischa Perino
Grischa Perino is an economist and professor at the Department of Socioeconomics, part of Hamburg’s Faculty of Business, Economics and Social Sciences (WiSo). He is an expert on emissions trading systems and has advised the EU Commission, the German Environment Agency (UBA) and the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action on EU emissions trading.
After completing his basic studies and Ph.D. in Bonn, Freiburg, Heidelberg and at the University College London, followed by stays at the University of Cambridge and University of East Anglia, he was appointed a Professor at Universität Hamburg in 2013. At the Cluster of Excellence CLICCS he co-leads, together with Prof. Antje Wiener and Junior Professor Stefan Aykut, the project “Dynamics of Climate Governance” – and is a member of the steering committee for its continued funding application.
