Virginia Burkett

Virginia Burkett is the Chief Scientist for Climate and Land Use Change, International Programs at the United States Geological Survey (USGS). She was appointed Co-Chair of the U.S. Global Change Research Program in 2016 and served as Chair during 2017-2019. Virginia is the US alternate representative to the Executive Committee of GEO. She has published extensively on the topics of global change and low-lying coastal zones. Virginia was a Lead Author of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Third, Fourth and Fifth Assessment Reports and the IPCC Technical Paper on Water.  She also was a Lead Author of the First, Second, and Third U.S. National Climate Assessments and she served on the Federal Steering Committee for the Fourth National Climate Assessment (2018).