Parker Liautaud

Parker Liautaud is a polar explorer and climate change campaigner. Since 2010, he has undertaken three expeditions to the North Pole and one to the South Pole. In 2013, he led the Willis Resilience Expedition, a record-breaking Antarctic journey that reached the South Pole on December 24th. During the two-part expedition, he and his team first crossed Antarctica over 1900 kilometers from coast to coast, conducting research on the climate system in a custom-built scientific support vehicle. In the second part of the journey, he and a teammate separated from the truck and trekked 565 kilometers from the Ross Ice Shelf, completing the fastest human-powered journey to the South Pole; in doing so, Parker also became the youngest man to walk to the South Pole at the time.

The expedition implemented a 16-episode live broadcast dedicated to climate change, which hosted 25 debates and discussions with leading experts from the scientific community, the private sector, NGOs, and government.

Through his expeditions, Parker has partnered with leading academic institutions, including the International Atomic Energy Agency, GNS New Zealand, and others to conduct research on the climate system.

Parker regularly speaks at conferences, universities, and some of the world’s largest companies on climate issues. Recently, he delivered remarks at the Clinton Global Initiative’s 2014 Annual Meeting; he moderated a discussion on climate leadership between Kofi Annan and President Mary Robinson at a summit in Dublin, Ireland; and was interviewed by former Vice President Al Gore at the UN Foundation’s Social Good Summit.

His work has been featured widely in the international press, including in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Guardian.

In March 2014, Parker was honored by The White House in a joint event with the Department of the Interior and the Council on Environmental Quality. He was named to TIME Magazine’s 30 Under 30 list of people changing the world in 2013.

Parker studies Geology and Geophysics at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. In April 2014, he joined the Directorate of the Yale Climate & Energy Institute and became a Fellow at the Institute.