The IPCC and the Peace Prize - Climate Change: The Facts - page 156

Planners' guide for 2011-2013, Brisbane City Council boasted that a keynote address by
'Nobel Prize winner' Howden was one of the high points of a convention held recently in
that city. 8
Thescaleofthismisunderstandingisunlikelytohaveextendedsofarhadthechairman
of the IPCC not been setting the worst possible example. The fact that Rajendra Pachauri
attended a ceremony and delivered an acceptance speech on behalf of his organisation did
not magically transform him, personally, into a Nobel laureate. There should have been no
confusion on this point since the prize money wasn't given to Pachauri—it was bestowed
on the IPCC, which used it to fund scholarships.
But a startling array of respectable organisations apparently believe that Pachauri
himself became a Nobelist via the same application of pixie dust that transformed other
IPCC personnel. The first thing Amazon.com tells us about his 2010 novel, Return to
Almora , is that it was written by a 'Nobel laureate'. 9
Take a spin with an internet search engine and thousands of news articles, interviews,
videos,andphotosallpromulgatingthemyththatPachaurihaspersonallyreceivedaNobel
prizewillpresentthemselves.Againandagain,theimplicationisthatthepublicshouldpay
close attention to what Pachauri is saying. He isn't just anyone, we're told—he's a Nobel
laureate. Except that he's not.
Among those who've erroneously described Pachauri in this manner we find: the US
Secretary of State, the office of the Prime Minister of Norway, the Mayor of London, the
New York Academy of Sciences, the United Nations Environment Programme, the UN
Economic Commission for Africa, United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), the World
Bank, the Asian Institute of Technology, the World Wildlife Fund, 350.org , EarthDay.org ,
DemocracyNow.org , the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation, the Australian Broadcasting
Corporation,theBBC, The New York Times , The Japan Times , Der Spiegel , The Vancouver
Sun , and The Times of India .
This fiction has also infected university campuses. In 2009, North Carolina State
University issued a press release titled 'Nobel Laureate to Deliver Fall Commencement
Address at NC State'. Judging by its first sentence—which describes Pachauri as a Nobel
Prize winner and NC State alumnus—everyone who attended that event was misinformed
in this regard.
Yale University's Environment 360 magazine, a prestigious, specialist publication that
should know better, titled an article 'A Conversation with Nobel Prize Winner Rajendra
Pachauri'. A few years ago, Utrecht University, in the Netherlands, sponsored a lecture by
'NobelLaureateRajendraPachauri'aspartofamastersdegreeprogram.TheUniversityof
Eastern Finland has gone so far as to make 'Nobel Prize Winner, IPCC Chair Dr Pachauri'
its first honourary professor.