Hervé Le Treut studied physics at the Ecole Normale Supérieure, and very early on turned his attention to the study of the climate system. After a long career at the CNRS, he is currently a professor at Sorbonne University and the Ecole Polytechnique.
A former director of the Institut Pierre Simon Laplace and a member of the Académie des Sciences, he has participated in 4 GIEC reports, was a member of the Scientific Committee of the Global Climate Research Programme and was a member of the COP21 monitoring committee. Much of his work has been devoted to developing global climate models, but in recent years he has focused on the regional dimension of climate change, through the Acclimaterra project in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region.