It is now almost 3 years since we lost our dear brother, John Houghton. We have just learned of a tribute by his and our good friend Bob White that was published in The Royal Society several months ago.

The picture above is from the article – I daresay none of us have seen him this young. Following is a brief excerpt:

John Houghton made seminal contributions to understanding the temperature and structure of the stratosphere. After gaining the highest first in physics at Oxford, his DPhil involved building a radiometer that was flown in a post-war Mosquito. It started a long interest in developing instrumentation. He completed his National Service doing research into atmospheric composition at the Royal Aircraft Establishment at Farnborough, then returned to 21 years in Oxford. He led a team that, with others, built a series of instruments launched on Nimbus satellites during 1970 to 1978 to measure infrared radiation from the stratosphere. At age 48 he left academia to head up the Appleton Research Laboratories, tasked to move them to the Rutherford Laboratory and realign their work from upper atmospheric radio research to space support. Four years later he was appointed director general of the Meteorological Office. In his eight-year term, he moved it from dependence on the Ministry of Defence to becoming an independent agency, developed its commercial arm and strengthened its research. He also founded the Hadley Centre to work on climate-related issues. His most significant global contribution was helping to set up the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), then chairing its working group on scientific assessments through their first three reports during 1990 to 2001. After retirement he devoted his time to raising awareness of climate change through many lectures and articles, and co-founded the John Ray Initiative to address the challenges of sustainable development and environmental stewardship. Appropriately, the Sixth IPCC WG1 Assessment Report in August 2021 was dedicated posthumously to him.

…In 2007 the IPCC was announced as the joint recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, shared with Al Gore Jr. The citation stated it was ‘for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change’. John, along with a group of others from the IPCC, were delighted to attend the ceremony. It remained one of the highlights of his career, along with receiving the Japan Prize in the previous year. In August 2021, the sixth assessment report was released with a posthumous dedication to Sir John Houghton, a mark of the respect in which the scientific community held him.

Read the rest of the article here.

Two years ago near the beginning of the pandemic the world, and in particular the Creation Care family, lost a champion and a friend when Sir John Houghton left us. His memorial service was held only recently near his home in Wales, and the John Ray Institute (JRI) has an excellent report on the service from Martin Hodson.

Some excerpts:

The service was a wonderful and fitting tribute to Sir John. His widow, Sheila, who had organised the service in accordance with Sir John’s wishes, rose to thank all the people who had come, those who had taken part as he had hoped, and those who had helped to get the hall ready the previous day. She also illustrated the one love of Sir John’s which had not been mentioned previously, and that was music. Her final thanks were to the local organist, Tudur Jones, who had played throughout the service including a rousing rendition of Cwm Rhonda as the final hymn. She then announced he would play Sir John’s favourite organ piece, Bach’s Toccata and Fugue, to conclude before a great spread of food was enjoyed…

…And so we all left Neuadd Dyfi, and went our separate ways. I reflected on a life well-lived, and the huge honour it has been to be a small part of the story. I just wish more people had taken Sir John seriously about climate change earlier. But sadly too many people are still not taking it seriously. Look at some of the recent UK government announcements on new oil fields, fracking, and coal mines. And our government is far from the only one.  Consider the horrendous heatwave in India and Pakistan. We really are in a very perilous situation, and even now governments are in the grip of the fossil fuel lobby. Sir John had to battle with that lobby for many years. It is our job to take up that fight. May God help us all in this task.

May God raise up more like him.