John Sweeney

Biography

Professor John Sweeney has been a lecturer at Maynooth University Geography Department since 1978. He received a First Class Honours B.Sc. from the University of Glasgow in 1974 and was a awarded a PhD also from Glasgow in 1980. John has taught courses primarily related to climatology, but he has also taught biogeography, geomorphology and environmental resource management and has taught and researched at a number of universities in North America and Africa. He has also been involved in course design and curriculum development matters at second and third levels. Over the past 30 years he has published approximately 60 scientific papers and edited/co-authored 4 texts on various aspects of climatology and climate change in Ireland. He has served a number of national academic societies as President, Secretary and Treasurer as well as being the Irish representative on a number of European academic bodies. He currently leads a number of nationally funded funded research projects examining various aspects of climate change in Ireland. Professor Sweeney contributed to the reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007. John is currently President of An Taisce, the National Trust of Ireland.

Research Interest

Climate Change, Climatology, Air Pollution