LEACH, Gerald (Adrian) 1933-2004

OBITUARY NOTICE—

See index for CA sketch: Born January 4, 1933, in Colombo, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka); died of obstructive pulmonary disease December 10, 2004. Journalist, broadcaster, environmentalist, and author. Leach was a popular science writer who later became influential as an energy strategist who urged nations around the world to use their resources responsibly. Receiving his B.A. from Clare College, Cambridge, in 1955, he embarked on his journalism career in 1957 as a reporter for the Manchester Guardian. Leach's interest in science led him to focus on that subject as a journalist, and he appeared on British television as the host of the science series It Can Happen Tomorrow from 1958 to 1959. He remained with the British Broadcasting Corporation for the next couple of years as a television producer and writer before joining Discover magazine as an editor in 1961. During the late 1960s he was science correspondent for the New Statesman, and from 1969 until 1972 was science correspondent for the London Observer. It was during the 1970s that Leach began to get involved in environmentalism. The oil crisis at the time sparked concerns around the world that energy sources were running out, and U.S. scientists warned that if civilization stayed its current course the world would be destroyed by pollution and overpopulation. Joining the University of Sussex's Science Policy Research Unit in 1972, Leach developed mathematical models that showed that such a disaster could be avoided if people began using resources responsibly. Beginning in 1974, he was hired as senior fellow at the International Institute for Environment and Development in London, and he began to take on the role of energy adviser to Third World nations. He published a number of books on energy use, one of his most influential being 1988's Beyond the Woodfuel Crisis: People, Land, and Trees in Africa. Other books by Leach include New Sources of Energy (1966), The Biocrats (1970), and the coauthored books Energy: Global Prospects 1985-2000 (1977) and Energy and Growth (1986).

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Guardian (Manchester, England), January 21, 2005, p. 31.

Times (London, England), January 11, 2005, p. 53.