* In February 2009, James Hansen urged
Americans to support a March 2 protest at the Capitol Power Plant in
Washington, DC, “to send a message to Congress and the president
that we want them to take the actions that are needed
to preserve climate for young people and future generations” by
“phas[ing] out the biggest source of carbon—and that's
coal.”
* Hansen
has been arrested several times for his participation in
demonstrations focusing on various environmental issues. In June
2009 in Raleigh County, West Virginia, he and 30 other protesters
were arrested on misdemeanor charges of obstructing police and
impeding traffic during a rally against mountaintop removal mining.
In September
2010 he was one of more than 100 people arrested in front of the
White House during another rally against those same mining practices. And
in August
2011, Hansen was one of 143 activists arrested in front of the
White House in rally exhorting President Obama to reject the Keystone
Pipeline extension.
* As
of March 2010,
Hansen was listed as a member
of the Science and Security Board for the Bulletin
of the Atomic Scientists,
a
publication whose early personnel were accused of providing vital
nuclear information that helped the Soviet Union develop its
first atomic bomb. Two of the magazine's founding sponsors, Leo
Szilard and Robert Oppenheimer, were accused of passing information
from the Manhattan Project, in which they were key participants, to
the Soviets.
* In 1996 Hansen was elected
to the National Academy of Sciences. In 2001 he received the
Seventh Annual Heinz Award in the Environment for his research on
global warming. In 2006 Hansen was listed as one of Time
magazine's “100 Most Influential People.” That same year, he
received the American Association for the Advancement of Science's
Award for Scientific Freedom and Responsibility. In 2007, Hansen shared the Dan David Prize for "achievements having an outstanding
scientific, technological, cultural or social impact on our world."
In 2008, he received the PNC Bank Common Wealth Award of
Distinguished Service for his "outstanding achievements" in
science. Also in 2008, Hansen was named by EarthSky
Communications and a panel of 600 scientist-advisors as the "Scientist
Communicator of the Year." In 2009, he was awarded the Carl-Gustaf Rossby Research Medal by
the American Meteorological Society, for his "outstanding
contributions to climate modeling, understanding climate change
forcings and sensitivity, and for clear communication of climate
science in the public arena." In 2010 Hansen won the Sophie Prize, for his "key role for the development of our
understanding of human-induced climate change."
