Adaptation Can Help Mitigation: An Integrated Approach to Post-2012 Climate Policy
38 Pages Posted: 10 Nov 2011 Last revised: 22 Nov 2011
There are 2 versions of this paper
Adaptation Can Help Mitigation: An Integrated Approach to Post-2012 Climate Policy
Adaptation Can Help Mitigation: An Integrated Approach to Post-2012 Climate Policy
Date Written: November 10, 2011
Abstract
The latest round of international negotiations in Copenhagen led to a set of commitments on emission reductions which are unlikely to stabilise global warming below or around 2°C. As a consequence, in the absence of additional ambitious policy measures, adaptation will be needed to address climate-related damages. What is the role of adaptation in this setting? How is it optimally allocated across regions and time? To address these questions, this paper analyses the optimal mix of adaptation and mitigation expenditures in a cost-effective setting in which countries cooperate to achieve a long-term stabilisation target (550 CO2-eq). It uses an Integrated Assessment Model (AD-WITCH) that describes the relationships between different adaptation modes (reactive and anticipatory), mitigation, and capacity-building to analyse the optimal portfolio of adaptation measures. Results show the optimal intertemporal distribution of climate policy measures is characterised by early investments in mitigation followed by large adaptation expenditures a few decades later. Hence, the possibility to adapt does not justify postponing mitigation, although it reduces its costs. Mitigation and adaptation are thus shown to be complements rather than substitutes.
Keywords: Climate Change Impacts, Mitigation, Adaptation, Integrated Assessment Model
JEL Classification: Q54, Q56, Q43
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation
Do you have a job opening that you would like to promote on SSRN?
Recommended Papers
-
An Analysis of Adaptation as a Response to Climate Change
By Francesco Bosello, Carlo Carraro, ...
-
Climate Policy and the Optimal Balance between Mitigation, Adaptation and Unavoided Damage
By Francesco Bosello, Carlo Carraro, ...
-
Climate Policy and the Optimal Balance between Mitigation, Adaptation and Unavoided Damage
By Francesco Bosello, Carlo Carraro, ...
-
Dynamic Uncertainty and Global Warming Risk
By Francesco Bosello and Michele Moretto
-
Adapting and Mitigating to Climate Change: Balancing the Choice Under Uncertainty
By Francesco Bosello and Chen Chen
-
Adaptation and Mitigation in Long-Term Climate Policies
By Thierry Bréchet, Natalia Hritonenko, ...