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Mitigation and adaptation within a climate change policy portfolio: A research program
Citation:
Felgenhauer, T. Mitigation and adaptation within a climate change policy portfolio: A research program. Joint US EPA & NCSU Poster Session for EPA and NCSU Researchers, Raleigh, NC, May 15, 2012.
Impact/Purpose:
This poster outlines a research program that looks at mitigation and adaptation within a public policy portfolio.
Description:
It is now recognized that optimal global climate policy is a portfolio of the two key responses for reducing the risks of climate change: mitigation and adaptation. Significant differences between the two responses have inhibited understanding of how to appropriately view these two key strategies in a coherent policy framework. In order to understand the relevant relationships and tradeoffs that occur when mitigation and adaptation are considered together, two particular dimensions are fundamental: strategy investment lifetimes and related capacity limits in reducing climate damages, and strategy dynamics under uncertainty. We present three stylized classes of adaptation investment types as a conceptual framework : short-lived “flow” spending, committed “stock” investment, and lower capacity “option stock” with the capability of future upgrading. This framework is applied to the economic modeling of mitigation with different adaptation types, and its implications are investigated for the likelihood of a post-Kyoto climate regime with both participation and compliance by relevant national parties. Future research into the limits of adaptation as well as international risk trading on both mitigation and adaptation are described.