Professor Keith Shine FRS

Keith Shine conducts research in the fields of meteorology and climate science, with a focus on understanding how human activity initiates climate change. Keith is also interested in the role played by water vapour in the Earth’s energy balance, which considers the energy flows both into and away from the Earth in the form of shortwave radiation from the Sun and longwave (infrared) radiation emitted by the Earth and its atmosphere, respectively.

In addition, Keith is at the forefront of identifying and quantifying radiative forcing, a way of measuring the strength of climate-change mechanisms. He has been heavily involved in major United Nations’ assessments of climate change and stratospheric ozone depletion, and was a lead author of the 1995 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change assessment report.

Keith was appointed Regius Professor of Meteorology and Climate Science at the University of Reading in 2013, and is the first holder of this post, which was awarded to the university by Her Majesty The Queen to mark the Diamond Jubilee.

Professional position

  • Regius Professor of Meteorology, Department of Meteorology, University of Reading

Subject groups

  • Earth and Environmental Sciences

    Atmospheric physics and meteorology, Climate sciences

Professor Keith Shine FRS
Elected 2009
Committees Participated Role
Sectional Committee 5: Earth & environmental sciences October 2022 - September 2025 Member
Hooke Committee January 2015 - December 2017 Member
Sectional Committee 5: Earth & environmental sciences December 2010 - December 2014 Chair