General Information

Professor Walter Leal is a distinguished "Euro-Professor", holding professorial posts at Universities in Germany (Chair of Climate Change Management at the Hamburg University of Applied Sciences), United Kingdom (Manchester Manchester Metropolitan University), Sweden (University of Uppsala) and Poland (Merito University). He has two main research interests. The first is in the field of sustainable development, where he holds a world record of publications, some of which are available here: https://www.haw-hamburg.de/en/ftz-nk/programmes/iusdrp/ (please scroll down and clickon "sharing"). The second is climate change, to which he has been providing a key contribution to the literature, also including aspects of climate change and health.

He holds various doctoral and advanced doctoral degrees, such as the degrees of:

  • Philosophy Doctor (PhD)
  • Doctor of Sciences (DSc)
  • Doctor of Philosophy (DPhil)
  • Doctor of Education (DEd)
  • Doctor of Letters (DL)
  • Doctor of Technology (DTech)

Indexes: ORCID – Scopus – Google Scholar – Research Gate

He is a member of the following professional bodies:

  • Fellow, Society of Biology
  • Fellow, Royal Geographical Society (FRGS)
  • Fellow, Linnean Society (FLS)

His field experience in over 70 countries, involves missions undertaken on behalf of various international organisations (e.g. European Union, World Bank, OECD, UNESCO, UNEP) and attendance to specialised events in North America, Latin America/Caribbean, Europe, Africa, Asia and Pacific Region, and the Middle East.

Among the many awards he has received, it can be mentioned the 1999 “Leading Editor of the Year Award” and the 2000 “Editor of the Year Award”, by MCB University Press, the “Eco-Citizen Award” (2001) in Rio de Janeiro and the Aurelio Giuseppe Prize awarded by the Italian Council of Ministers for his environmental work. Moreover, he was awarded the “Golden Page Award” (April 2003) in London for his editorial work and the North Sea Star Award (2006) by the EU-Interreg Secretariat for his project work in the North Sea Region.

In the field of sustainable development, Professor Walter Leal is the founder of the European School of Sustainability Science and Research, the Inter-University Sustainable Development Research Programme (IUSDRP), the Euro­pean-North American Sustainability Research Consortium and the German and Brazilian Science and Technology Network (GERBRAS-SCIENCENET).

He is also editor of the World Sustainability Series with Springer.

In addition, he ist the founding editor of the International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education (IJSHE) launched in the year 2000. IJSHE is the only journal which fully focuses on sustainability in a higher education context.

Professor Walter Leal is also Editor-in-Chief of the Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals currently being prepared. With 17 volumes, one devoted to each SDG, more than 1.700 chapters and in excess of 2.300 authors, this is the largest editorial project on matters related to sustainable development, ever undertaken.

In the field of climate change, Professor Walter Leal is equally active. Apart from this contributions ot the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change as a Review Editor (AR5) and Lead Author and Contributing Author (AR6), he is the founder and Chairman of the International Climate Change Research and Information Programme (ICCIRP), created in 2008. He has extensive experience on climate change adaptation, especially in developing countries, and created in 2008 the „Climate Management Management Series“ with Springer, which is the leading peer-reviewed book series on climate change. The Series, to which he acts as the Editor, has produced to date a comprehensive body of publications on climate change, among which mention may be made to the Handbook of Climate Change Adaptation with 3 volumes and around 150 authors, and the Handbook of Climate Change Resilience with 4 volumes and over 200 authors. Professor Walter Leal is also founding editor (also in the year 2008) of the International Journal of Climate Change Strategies and Management, an open access journal which works on the nexus between climate change mitigation and adaptation.

Professor Walter Leal regularly provides advice for banks (e.g. KfW, World Bank), and has been member of the investigation panels of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) as part of their project complaint mechanisms. He frequently offers expert advice to credit institutes, development and aid agencies (e.g. Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office in the UK, SIDA, GIZ, NORAD, UN organisations, regulatory bodies and various foundations). He also often acts as an evaluator for funding bodies, UN agencies and research councils, in the process of examining project proposals. His long-term experience with project design and management means that he is well placed to provide advice and technical support to these agencies, which may guide their funding decisions and future project development plans.

Professor Walter Leal is fluent in various languages such as English, German, Portuguese, Spanish and French, which is very helpful in performing international assignments.

His contact address is: walter.leal2@haw-hamburg.de.

Teaching experience

Professor Leal has extensive teaching experience and has run a variety of courses, both at the undergraduate and post-graduate level, on matters related to ecology, environmental sciences, sustainable development and climate change, including aspects of environment and health and climate change and health.

Experience with supervision of students

Professor Leal has supervised to date well in excess of 120 BSc students, as well as over 80 MSc and 50 PhD and post-doctoral (“Habilitation”) students. At present, he acts as a supervisor or co-supervisor for 12 PhD students, undertaking their PhD research on issues related to sustainable development and climate change.

Experience with research projects

Over the course of his career, Professor Leal has coordinated, co-coordinated or acted as a partner in a large number of projects on environment, energy, sustainable development and climate change, whose combined budget is in excess of Euro 84 million.

Download: The list projects undertaken over the past 13 years (PDF).

Publications

Professor Leal has been author, co-author, editor or co-editor in many publications on matters related to environment, sustainable development and climate change issues. He has in excess of 800 publications to his credit, which includes 196 books, 108 book chapters and over 500 papers.

Books

Book chapters

Papers

Edited special issues of journals

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Inquiries can be directed to the following e-mail addresses: walter.leal2@haw-hamburg.de