Richard A. Houghton Ph.D.

Senior Scientist Emeritus

Research area

Carbon

Contact

Email: rhoughton@woodwellclimate.org ResearchGate Google Scholar CV

I discovered a surprising disconnect between the fields of ecology and global carbon modeling when I was a graduate student, and I have spent my career working to bridge that gap. I am an ecologist who studies the role that terrestrial ecosystems play in climate change and the global carbon cycle. My early work highlighted the importance of land use changes in generating carbon emissions. While I work primarily with empirical carbon bookkeeping models, I am constantly looking for the basic biological and ecological processes that could explain the results they generate.

Above: Dr. Houghton speaks to high school students from Martha’s Vineyard.

I have helped shape Woodwell Climate and my research field at large. I contributed to the reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007. In 2012, I was elected a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union. In 2014, I accepted the International Center for Climate Governance award for the world’s top-ranked climate change think tank on behalf of Woodwell Climate Research Center (then Woods Hole Research Center).

I have served as Acting Director and Acting President, and held the George M. Woodwell Chair for Global Ecology from 2011-2021. When I’m not at work, I spend time on my property at the edge of the woods, reading, brewing beer, and practicing tai chi.

About half of fossil fuel emissions are absorbed by the land and oceans. As carbon dioxide in the atmosphere increases, we would expect that fraction to decrease and we don’t understand fully why it hasn’t.