cc: hqpo@nerc.ac.uk,m.hulme@uea date: Thu, 15 Feb 2001 09:36:39 +0000 from: Trevor Davies subject: Tyndall Centre - MoU with Julian Hunt's planned centre to: dab@nerc.ac.uk Dear David, CONFIDENTIAL We (Mike Hulme and I) and members of the Applied Research for Climate Change consortium (UCL, Imperial College and University of Reading) have met to consider if we can arrive at a "joint statement" for ARCC's application to the Faraday Scheme. Attached is what we have come up with so far. This is something of an attempt at the impossible, but we have striven to be constructive and, in the circumstances, is probably the best we can do. We have made it clear that, from our point of view, any such agreement should be approved by the Research Councils. We are concerned because, irrespective of what the document actually says, it is quite clear that Lord Hunt (who is leading up ARCC) persists with a very imprecise appreciation of what the Tyndall Centre is about, and what ARCC's remit should be (we have been dealing with one of his colleagues over this document). His starting point was that the Tyndall Centre will concentrate on "climate prediction" and ARCC will consider the "impacts". Despite this misconception, ARCC has not considered how it complements/cuts across UKCIP. Although we succeeded in convincing him that it was the Hadley Centre, and not we, who will continue to be involved in climate prediction, he seemed to find it difficult to appreciate exactly where our thrust lies. For example, he found it hard to understand that we do not intend to feed directly into government "operational" policy, and equally difficult to understand that we intend to work closely with non-government stakeholders. We do not believe that this was due to any failing on our part in our attempts to explain what our objectives are. Nevertheless, we have reconciled ourselves to the fact that there should be an agreement, even if it will have to be based on a rather contrived separation of our and ARCC's apparent priorities. We shall be very grateful if you are able to read through this, and indicate if you are comfortable with it. With Best Wishes, Trevor & Mike Attachment Converted: "c:\eudora\attach\Tyndall3.doc" ++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Professor Trevor D. Davies Dean, School of Environmental Sciences University of East Anglia Norwich NR4 7TJ United Kingdom Tel. +44 1603 592836 Fax. +44 1603 507719 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++