Guest post by: Indur M. Goklany
In a series of posts (collected here) we saw that no matter how significant climate change may seem when viewed in isolation, it pales in significance when compared with other global problems, at least through the foreseeable future. This is hardly surprising: in the absence of context even the smallest molehill may be mistaken for a Mount Everest.
So how should we deal with climate change in the context of other more significant threats to human and environmental well-being?
The following figure, reproduced from the earlier set of posts, shows the maximum contribution of climate change to global mortality from hunger, malaria and coastal flooding in the year 2085 under various IPCC emissions scenarios. Specifically, it shows that climate change would contribute no more than 4%-10% to global mortality from these factors. The highest such contribution occurs under the warmest-but-richest (A1FI) scenario. [Under this scenario, the average global temperature is projected to increase by 4°C between 1990 and 2085.]
Therefore if we could roll climate back to its 1990 level —which means reducing CO2 concentrations to below that magic 350 ppm number — then the mortality in 2085 from hunger, malaria and coastal flooding would, at most, be reduced by 4%-10% through “mitigation”. [In climate change parlance, “mitigation” means reducing greenhouse gas emissions or concentrations, whereas “adaptation” would reduce damages (or negative impacts) from climate change.]
But what about the remaining 90%-96% of the mortality problem? Annual mortality would still be between 2 million and 6 million, depending on the IPCC scenario employed. The Kyoto Protocol, on the other hand, would reduce climate change by less than 10%. Hence, as a first approximation, the Protocol would, had the US participated and if all nations meet their obligations fully, reduce mortality by less than 1% (= 10% of 10%) in 2085.
By contrast, if we focus on reducing societies’ vulnerabilities to hunger, malaria and coastal flooding through measures that would work regardless of climate change (see bullets below), we would be able to address 100% of the future mortality problem in 2085. Such an approach, which I call “focused adaptation,” could, moreover, bring larger benefits — and bring them quicker, because any significant benefits from emission reductions, regardless of their stringency, will be delayed by decades (due to the inertia of the climate system).
Focused adaptation can be generalized beyond hunger, malaria and coastal flooding if we focus on reducing vulnerability or increasing resiliency to any climate-sensitive problem that could be exacerbated by climate change (see here.]
Another critical advantage of adaptation is that it can capture the benefits of climate change while reducing its costs, whereas mitigation would indiscriminately reduce both the positive and the negative impacts of climate change. That is, mitigation is a double-edged sword, whereas adaptation is a scalpel.
Thus, we saw previously (here) that climate change would reduce both the net population at risk of water stress, and habitat converted to cropland. Both these benefits of climate change would be lost under mitigation. On the other hand, adaptation would more selectively capitalize on these positive impacts.
In addition, focused adaptation would be more economic than emission reduction. The Kyoto Protocol, despite its minimal effectiveness, is estimated to cost around $165 billion annually. [See here.] Although the cost of rolling the climate back to its 1990 level has never been estimated, suffice it to say that it should cost orders of magnitude more. For the purposes of this exercise, in the following I will assume a lower bound of $165 billion annually.
However, results from the UN Millennium Project and the IPCC’s latest assessment indicate that, via focused adaptation, we could:
- Reduce malaria by 75% at a cost of $3 billion/yr. Specific measures include improving antenatal care for expectant mothers in vulnerable areas, developing a malaria vaccine, indoor residual spraying with DDT, and insecticide treated bed nets.
- Reduce hunger by 50% at a cost of $12-15 billion/yr (see here, p. 18, and here) Specific measures could include the development of crops that would do better in poor climatic or soil conditions (namely, drought, water-logging, high salinity or acidity) that could be exacerbated by climate change, and under the higher CO2 and temperature conditions that are likely to prevail in the future.
- Reduce vulnerability to coastal flooding at a cost of $2-10 billion/yr. e.g., through building and strengthening coastal defenses, insurance reform, and improving early warning systems.
In addition to mitigation and focused adaptation, there is another approach to dealing with climate change.
Developing countries are generally deemed to be most vulnerable to climate change, not necessarily because they will experience greater climate change, but because they lack adaptive capacity (that is, financial and human capital) to acquire and use the technologies necessary to cope with its impacts. Hence, another approach to addressing climate change would be to enhance the adaptive capacity of developing countries by promoting broad development, i.e., economic development and human capital formation, which, of course, is the point of sustainable economic development.
Advancing economic development and human capital formation would also advance society’s ability to cope with all manner of threats, whether climate related or not (see here and here). The costs and benefits of sustainable economic development can be garnished from literature on the UN’s Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which were devised to promote sustainable development in developing countries. The benefits associated with these goals — halving global poverty; halving hunger, halving the lack of access to safe water and sanitation; reducing child and maternal mortality by 66 percent or more; providing universal primary education; and reversing growth in malaria, AIDS/HIV, and other major diseases — would exceed the benefits flowing from the deepest mitigation. Yet the additional annual cost to the richest countries of attaining the MDGs by 2015 is estimated at 0.5 percent of their GDP, approximately the same as that of the ineffectual Kyoto Protocol.
Hence, we have a choice. We could over the foreseeable future:
- Spend $165 billion annually on the Kyoto Protocol to reduce mortality from hunger, malaria and coastal flooding by less than 0.4%-1%, while marginally increasing the population at risk of water stress, and reducing habitat available for the rest of nature.
- Spend much more than $165 billion annually to roll back climate to 1990 levels and reduce mortality from hunger, malaria and coastal flooding by less than 4%-10%, while substantially increasing the population at risk of water stress, and reducing the amount of habitat available for the rest of nature.
- Spend about $34 billion annually on focused adaptation to reduce mortality by 50%-75% from the three above-mentioned risk factors without increasing either the population at risk of water stress or the habitat lost to cropland. [Details can be found here.]
- Spend $165 billion annually on broad economic development to garnish benefits greater than what can be obtained through rolling climate back to 1990 levels, or even focused adaptation.
- It shows that through the foreseeable future, adaptation — whether it is focused or based on broad development — is far superior to mitigation. Either adaptation approach will provide far greater benefits than even the deepest mitigation, and at a lower cost. And these conclusions hold regardless of the choice of discount rate, or fanciful scenarios beyond the foreseeable future.
This, of course, doesn’t necessarily mean that there is no role for mitigation, particularly in the long term. But in the short- to medium-term, that role shouldn’t include heroic emission reduction measures (see here).
Table 1: Costs and benefits of various mitigation and adaptation approaches. Note that figures in red indicate that the policies in question would make matters worse. Source: Goklany (2009).
Basically, this is an argument from the assumption of a tolerable outcome. There might have been a time for analyses like this, and Bjorn Lomborg’s. Back when the AGW projected consequencees were small, and in the distant future. But not now.
These analyses are for skeptics who are “delayers”. They accept that AGW exists, but argue that it is happening slowly. So, there are no arguments here for skeptics who are “deniers”. For example: sea level rise is already assumed. So, “that won’t happen” doesn’t address the issue.
The graph is based on papers from 2004, 2004, 2002, and 1999. Knowledge and computer models have improved a lot since then. And today’s projections are more pessimistic than even those of the more recent IPCC(2007). If this same analysis were done on current data, it would inevitably produce much higher AGW mortality.
“This, of course, doesn’t necessarily mean that there is no role for mitigation, particularly in the long term.”
These studies would have used the old 100 year life for CO2 staying in the atmosphere.. But the more recent estimate is 1,000 years.
“…any stringent benefits from emissions reductions ((now)), regardless of their stringency, will be delayed by decades (due to the inertia of the climate system).”
Omitted from this argument is the eventual much greater “inertia” from existing and to be built coal plants, etc. Since emissions will eventually have to be reduced.
It is assumed that farmland (and water) will be available. Even as growing areas move northward (in the northern hemisphere). For US, its into Canada, until eventually stopped by poor soils.
This type of analysis that reduces consequences to fatalities is, of course, necessary for this comparative study. But the added level of analysis doesn’t help in evaluating AGW. Dust bowls from Kansas to California, and Spain to Greece. The consequences themselves are descriptive enough.
No allowance is made for the limited time available to solve the problem. A one meter sea level rise will produce 100,000,000 refugees. Many existing governments won’t be able to survive the trauma. Resulting dictatorships will be preoccupied with external military solutions; while fighting internal terrorists. The same climate changes will hit the United States and Europe…while they are paying mitigation costs, to prevent further sea level rises. So they won’t be able to help the less developed world.
I’ll accept all those adjectives, dear reader. But please help me out here. Where do all the refugees go?
Will the Hindu majority in India build a wall to keep out, say, 30,000,000 Moslems from Bangladesh. India will have its own problems; i.e., river water shortages, as the mountain glaciers retreat. So, do we just watch, as the Bangladeshi population dies back to a population that the remaining land area can support. Or, how many Bangladeshi refugees does the U.S. accept?
Presumably the United States and the European Union can take care of their own. But who feeds the rest of the refugees? In a future with more people, but less farmland.
The Kyoto Protocol (originally negotiated in 1997) was always a starter agreement. It was not meant to have the teeth of the final plan. And it follows that the actual costs will be much higher than the given $165 billion annually.
The Adaptation option has a consequence of its own, that is not related to the climate issue. When CO2 in the air dissolves in water it forms carbonic acid. The strength of the acid will be in proportion to the concentration in thse air. And, it will prevent the formation of shell material, which is made of CaCO3. And the effects will include some of the smallest creatures, at the very base of the food chain.
Basically, this is an argument from the assumption of a tolerable outcome. There might have been a time for analyses like this, and Bjorn Lomborg’s. Back when the AGW projected consequences were small, and in the distant future. But not now.
These analyses are for skeptics who are “delayers”. They accept that AGW exists, but argue that it is happening slowly. So, there are no arguments here for skeptics who are “deniers”. For example, sea level rise is already assumed. So, “that won’t happen” doesn’t address the issues.
The graph is based on papers from 2004, 2004, 20002, & 1999. Knowledge and computer models have improved a lot since then. And today’s projections are more pessimistic than even those of the more recent IPCC(2007). If the same analysis were done on current data it would inevitably produce much higher AGW mortality.
“This, of course, doesn’t necessarily mean that there is no role for mitigation, particularly in the long term”.
These studies would have used the old 100 year life for CO2 staying in the atmosphere. But the more recent estimate is 1,000 years.
“…any stringent benefits from emissions reductions ((now)), regardless of their stringency, will be delayed by decades (due to the inertia of the climate system).” Omitted from this argument is the much greater future “inertia” from existing and to be built coal plants, etc. Since emissions will eventually have to be reduced.
It is assumed that farmland (and water) will be available. Even as growing areas move northward (in this hemisphere). For US, its into Canada, until eventually stopped by poor soils.
This type of analysis that reduces consequences to fatalities is of course necessary for this comparative study. But the added level of analysis doesn’t help in evaluating AGW. Dust bowls from Kansas to California, and Spain to Greece. The consequences themselves are descriptive enough.
No allowance is made for the limited time available to solve the problem. A one meter sea level rise will produce 100,000,000 refugees. Many existing governments won’t be able to survive the trauma. Resulting dictatorshlips will be preoccupied with external military solutions, while fighting internal terrorists. The same climate changes will hit the United States and Europe. And they’ll still be paying mitigation costs, to prevent further sea level rises. So they won’t be able to help the less developed world.
I’ll accept all those adjectives, dear reader. But please help me out here. Where do the refugees go?
Will the Hindu majority in India build a wall to keep out, say, 30,000,000 Bangladeshi refugees? India will eventually have its own problems; i.e., river water shortages, as the mountain glaciers retreat. So, do we just watch as the Bangladeshi population dies back to a population that the remaining land area can support? Or, how many Bangladeshi refugees does the U.S.
accept?
Presumably the United States and European Union can take care of their own. But who feeds the rest of the refugees? In a future with more people, but less farmland.
The Kyoto Protocol (originally negotiated in 1997) was always a starter agreement. It was not meant to have the teeth of a final plan. And it follows, that the actual costs will be much higher than the given $165 billion annually.
The Adaptation option has a consequence of its own, that is not related to the climate issue. When CO2 in the air dissolves in water, it forms carbonic acid. The strenth of the acid will be in proportion to the concentration in the air. And, it will prevent the formation of shell material, which is made of CaCO3. Affected will be some of the smallest creatures; at the very base of the food chain.
Francis said;
” The graph is based on papers from 2004, 2004, 20002, & 1999. Knowledge and computer models have improved a lot since then. And today’s projections are more pessimistic than even those of the more recent IPCC(2007). If the same analysis were done on current data it would inevitably produce much higher AGW mortality.
“This, of course, doesn’t necessarily mean that there is no role for mitigation, particularly in the long term.
These studies would have used the old 100 year life for CO2 staying in the atmosphere. But the more recent estimate is 1,000 years.”
In that one short statement the belief that the science is settled is confounded several times. So the previous estimate of co2 life is out by a factor of 10? After $70 Billion spent on research we should be able to do better than that.
Tonyb
Tonyb (16:02:38)
I think the IPCC says it more carefully, when they say something like “AGW has about a 95% certainty”.
They don’t make any such claims for any of the details.
…..HINT…..The cosmic ray theory had one thing right, in that it was a greenhouse gas (water vapor) theory. Like CO2. So, it also fit the smaller characteristics: cooling stratosphere, and greatest warming found in night time minimum temperatures. So, look to the clouds.
Permission granted! Exhibit number one: Algore, who is increasing his wealth by an order of magnitude every few years.
/Mr Lynn
Maybe OT but nowhere else to post it. Seems New Zeland coming to it’s senses.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/opinion/2391896/Emission-plan-disaster-for-New-Zealand
Douglas DC: What if the “Climate Change” is a Maunder or Dalton type Solar Minimum?
RESPONSE: That is why increasing the level of economic development and human capital are critical. That increases adaptability, regardless of the direction of climate change. It also increases adaptatbility to any problem, whether it’s climate change or something else.
John F. Hultquist: Who is thinking about these issues, other than Dr. Goklany?
RESPONSE: AFAIK the only other person is Bjorn Lomborg, although the egotist in me insists I have been at this longer. See e.g., http://goklany.org/library/ADAPTV5_original_with_ExSum_no_figs.pdf. There is also some work by Tol and Dowlatabadi which is useful.
Eve, Kum Dollisson: [who argued about the effect of biofuels on mortality] Kum later on asks for “just One example of someone who died because of biofuels … 3 articles. Some generalized exhortations. A lot of arm-waving. No numbers. Nothing specific….”
RESPONSE: (1) Although I’m not sure where Eve got her figures from, note that the WHO attributed 3.7 million deaths to underweight (or hunger) in 2000 (see this post and references therein).
(2) While one cannot identify a real person who might have died from biofuel production, note that the table in the above post also claims deaths due to low intake of fruits and vegetables, air pollution, etc. I doubt that one can actually identify a real death with either of these. Deaths are attributed on the basis of statistics and inference. In fact, the deaths attributed to climate change included deaths actually due to malaria, malnutrition and diarrhea.
(3) It is quite likely that biofuel production increased the level of hunger, which would have increased the likelihood of some deaths due to malnutrition. Although by the end of 2008, commodity prices had declined more than 50 percent since the middle of 2008, the UN Food and Agricultural Organization’s Food Price Index was 28 percent higher in October 2008 than two years previously (FAO 2008a). This increase in prices, fueled in part by the general diversion of cropland to produce energy rather than food (and feed) fueled by energy subsidies and mandates in the US and the EU, reduced the availability of food for millions in the developing world (FAO 2008b, pp. 9-11). As a result, the FAO estimates that 963 million people worldwide were suffering from chronic hunger in 2008, an increase of 115 million compared to the 2003-2005 period (FAO 2000a; FAO 2008b, p. 2). This marks a reversal of one of mankind’s signal achievements of the 20th century — the reduction of hunger in developing countries. The proportion of the developing world’s population suffering from chronic hunger, which had declined from around 30-35 percent in 1969-1971 to 16 percent in 2003-2005, has now increased to about 18 percent (Goklany 2007; FAO 2008b).
As the FAO’s latest State of Food and Agriculture report notes, biofuel production would have a significant negative impact on hunger globally but provide relatively modest energy gains (FAO 2008b).
REFERENCES:
Food and Agricultural Organization [FAO]. (2008a). High-level conference on world food security: The challenges of climate change and bioenergy. FAO, Rome.
Food and Agricultural Organization [FAO]. (2008b). State of Food Insecurity 2008. FAO, Rome.
Food and Agricultural Organization [FAO]. (2008c). The State of Food and Agriculture 2008. FAO, Rome.
Goklany (2007), The Improving State of the World (Cato Institute, Washington, DC).
paul maynard : …the IPCC never takes into account a real positive feedback – more CO2 = more abundant plant growth=more food…
RESPONSE: Actually the analysis that my mortality estimates are based on did, in fact, consider increased yields from greater CO2 fertilization.
Daniel L. Taylor : Question: is it possible to prove that reducing CO2 output or temperature would harm an endangered species or habitat and, having done so, tie the EPA and any carbon legislation up in the courts for years or decades?
RESPONSE: Actually one can make a plausible argument that greater CO2 leads to more vegetation which should lead to more biomass which means it ought to be able to support more critters. Therefore less CO2 should mean that food for critters would be reduced, thereby increasing stress on them (and potentally endangering them).
John K. Sutherland : … the biggest threat to humanity and the environment… [is not] climate, pesticides, nuclear power, coal, or any of the usual suspects [but] ignorance and its bedfellow – poverty. Countered of course by education.
RESPONSE: I would recommend my book, The Improving State of the World, but you seem to have gotten its most important message.
E.M.Smith :
One Nit: “The Kyoto Protocol, on the other hand, would reduce climate change by less than 10%. ”This presumes that Kyoto would have lead to some CO2 reduction, which it would not, since China, India et. al. get a free pass and are growing emissions at an astounding rate.
RESPONSE: Actually I say “less than 10%” and it is estimated relative tio the situation in the absence of any Kyoto Protocol.
Francis :
(1) Basically, this is an argument from the assumption of a tolerable outcome.
RESPONSE: No it is not. It is based on an analysis of the cost-effectiveness of adaptation vs mitigation.
(2) There might have been a time for analyses like this, and Bjorn Lomborg’s. Back when the AGW projected consequencees were small, and in the distant future. But not now. …These analyses are for skeptics who are “delayers”. They accept that AGW exists, but argue that it is happening slowly. So, there are no arguments here for skeptics who are “deniers”. For example: sea level rise is already assumed. So, “that won’t happen” doesn’t address the issue. The graph is based on papers from 2004, 2004, 2002, and 1999. Knowledge and computer models have improved a lot since then. And today’s projections are more pessimistic than even those of the more recent IPCC(2007). If this same analysis were done on current data, it would inevitably produce much higher AGW mortality.
RESPONSE: (1) Francis, you made the same claim in previous threads. I asked for references backing your claims. You haven’t yet furnished any. But when I get them, I’ll be happy to look at them. I would also recommend that you do a critical analysis of the papers, their methodologies and assumptions, because unless you do that how do you know these analyses are credible?
(2) I note that IPCC (2007) also uses the same studies as the ones I used – not that this a particularly persuasive argument.
Francis (15:08:22) :
The Adaptation option has a consequence of its own, that is not related to the climate issue. When CO2 in the air dissolves in water, it forms carbonic acid. The strenth of the acid will be in proportion to the concentration in the air. And, it will prevent the formation of shell material, which is made of CaCO3. Affected will be some of the smallest creatures; at the very base of the food chain.
Francis,
I don’t understand that you come up with the dead old cow of ocean acidification.
It’s studied, it’s commented and it’s a HOAX.
Take a look at the Monckton Papers (just for a fast check).