Sophie Szopa, along with her fellow coordinating lead author (CLA) Vaishali Naik, provided the necessary leadership to deliver the 2021 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) chapter on short-lived climate forcers (SLCFs), which established the basis for comanagement of climate change and air quality.

Sophie Szopa has an extensive research career with major publications in modeling and analysis of atmospheric composition and chemistry. Recent work by Szopa’s research group merges models and ocean measurements to constrain the oceanic source of isoprene, which had been proposed to be an important source of reactivity over the remote oceans. She has participated in and led multiauthor assessments of tropospheric chemistry. For these reasons, she was selected as a lead author for the 2021 IPCC Sixth Assessment Report’s (AR6) chemistry chapter. The chemistry-climate chapter in IPCC reports is always a difficult one because it sits on the periphery of the core assessment of physical climate. The coupling of climate change and air quality—a natural one—has often been discouraged by the governments in the scoping of the chapters, or by other climate scientists. This has been the case since the IPCC Second Assessment Report (1995). In AR6, her chapter 6 on SLCFs was becoming difficult to draft when suddenly, late in the cycle of drafts, the two CLAs stepped down, leaving a vacuum. The IPCC leadership then promoted (tasked is a better word) Sophie Szopa and Vaishali Naik to be the CLAs with responsibility of delivering the chapter and getting it through the governments’ review. This leadership role occurred after the third lead author meeting, and then COVID hit, relegating the fourth lead author meeting to Zoom. So the AR6 was delivered without any further in-person meetings, which are usually essential to fine-tuning the chapters and reaching consensus among the authors. Sophie Szopa showed breadth and acumen in sorting through the published literature, in directing and incentivizing the lead author team, and in assembling a chapter that was able in the end to deliver a clear scientific assessment of short-lived climate forcers, to wit: Future air pollution changes are more likely driven by changes in emissions than in climate; and control of SLCFs may be critical for near-term climate goals.

From my direct experience, Sophie is a brilliant colleague and leader.

—Michael J. Prather, University of California, Irvine

I am truly grateful to have been awarded for my contribution toward raising awareness about environmental concerns related to atmospheric chemistry. This captivating field encompasses a diverse range of chemical compounds and intricate and transient processes, and has been at the heart of numerous global environmental crises for many years. However, despite its crucial function in exposing many people worldwide to hazardous levels of air pollution, which can adversely affect health, food production, and ecosystems, and can exacerbate climate change, this field remains often too little visible. It receives inadequate attention, with global assessments aimed at guiding policymakers addressing it only indirectly. In the sixth assessment cycle, IPCC accepted a chapter devoted to short-lived climate forcers (SLCFs), enabling us to assess together the knowledge on the evolution of emissions of reactive species and the oxidizing capacity of the troposphere, their interactions with climate, the effect of climate change on air pollution, and the potential future changes in SLCFs and their effects. This assessment highlights the importance of reducing methane emissions to mitigate short-term warming and ozone pollution, as well as the additional benefits for air quality that accompany decarbonization policies. However, it is important to note that ambitious air quality policies are also needed in many regions to ensure improved protection for populations. I am delighted to receive this award, as it acknowledges the importance of leading a collaborative effort to assess scientific knowledge to guide decisionmakers. Despite facing the challenge of COVID-19, our team of researchers from around the world demonstrated resilience and determination to achieve our common objective, overcoming cultural barriers and obstacles encountered during this period. This experience was a memorable journey that I had the pleasure of sharing with Vaishali Naik, with whom I am honored to receive this precious prize. I would like to pay tribute to Prof. Astrid Kiendler-Scharr, a lead author of this chapter on SLCFs and a brilliant aerosol specialist, who passed away this year. It is also rewarding to receive recognition from Michael Prather, who has advanced the comprehension of methane chemistry and consistently argued for improved consideration of short-lived species, particularly methane, in climate mitigation policies. He supported us throughout this assessment, and we are grateful to him. —Sophie Szopa, Paris-Saclay University, Paris