Accelerating the sustainability transition: Exploring synergies between adaptation and mitigation in British Columbian communities

While the focus of government climate change policy in many regions is on mitigation, research shows that integrated approaches, focusing equally on mitigation and adaptation, seen in the context of more general sustainability goals, may ultimately yield more productive outcomes. Since 2008, the province of British Columbia has mandated that local governments be carbon neutral in their own operations and has used a suite of policies, outreach and incentive tools to enable them to do so. The Meeting the Climate Change Challenge project explored eleven leading communities in B.C. to empirically examine how climate change policies and innovations are being framed and considered at the local scale.In this paper, we examine the synergies and trade-offs between adaptation, mitigation, and sustainability. Our findings suggest that, among leading communities, pursuing an integrated sustainability strategy (rather than a narrow focus on climate change) has the potential to yield benefits for both adaptation and mitigation in the majority of cases. The findings suggest that communities leading on climate innovation in the province have moved beyond a siloed approach in considering mitigation and adaptation. These findings have implications on integrated decision making at the municipal scale and multi-level governance, identifying both the challenges and the benefits inherent in pursuing multiple priorities simultaneously.     

US public opinion on climate change issues: implications for consensus-building and policymaking

While the Conference of the Parties wrangle at an international scale with climate policy, a quiet set of policies and measures is being implemented at a local scale by municipalities across the globe. This study examines the motivation municipalities have for undertaking policies to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, when the theory of free-ridingwould predict that local administrations should find it difficult to unilaterally reduce their emissions for the benefit of the global climate. Through interviews with officials and/or staff in 23 municipalities in the United States enacting climate policy, data are gathered that suggest local government abatement policies are primarily a top—down decision based on what officials or staff members believe to be “good business” or rational policy choices. They are primarily driven by the potential for realised or perceived cost savings and co-benefits rather than by public pressure. Economic data from some dozen municipal projects are analyzed, finding, while municipalities lack sophisticated accounting techniques, some justification for the often-disputed claim that at least initial reductions in emissions can be made at cost savings. In the United States, with the lack of national abatement policies, it is municipalities that are leading the way in beginning to implement mitigation strategies, even if only for initial reductions.     

Many roads to Paris: Explaining urban climate action in 885 European cities

Research on urban climate action has identified a broad range of potential factors explaining why and how local governments decide to tackle climate change. However, empirical evidence linking such factors in order to explain actual urban climate action has so far been mixed. To address this roadblock, our paper relies on a novel approach, postulating that different configurations of factors may lead to the same outcome (“equifinality”), through a qualitative comparative analysis (QCA). It is based on an available data set of local climate mitigation plans in 885 European cities. We find that urban climate action is systematically associated with four qualitatively different configurations of factors, each with its own consistent narrative (“networker cities”, “green cities”, “lighthouse cities”, “fundraising cities”). Crucially, some factors play a positive role in some configurations, a negative in others, and no role in further configurations (e.g., whether a city is located in a country with supportive national climate policies). This confirms that there is no single explanation for urban climate action. Achieving greater robustness in empirical research about urban climate action may thus require a shift, both conceptual and methodological, to the interactions between factors, allowing for different explanations in different contexts.     

PM2.5 and ozone pollution-related health challenges in Japan with regards to climate change

The degradation of air quality, an environmental consequence of anthropogenic activities, poses a challenge to human health. However, the corresponding control measures incur additional costs. This study presents an analysis of the health and socioeconomic benefits of air quality control measures and climate change mitigation. Multidisciplinary modelling was used for PM_2.5 and ozone distribution to analyze the co-benefits of end-of-pipe measures and electrification as well as their period-specific impacts on human health and the economy. The results indicated that the long-term impacts of end-of-pipe technologies and electrification in Japan's residential, building, and transportation sectors could reduce premature deaths, caused by PM_2.5 and ozone pollution, by 65,500 annually from 2010 to 2050. These technologies could save a per capita work hour loss of 3.64 h and avoid an economic loss of 5.43 billion USD by 2050. This study predicted climate actions would enable western Japan to benefit from PM_2.5 control measures, whereas the entire country would benefit from ozone pollution reduction.     

Global climate policy: will cities lead the way?

While the Conference of the Parties wrangle at an international scale with climate policy, a quiet set of policies and measures is being implemented at a local scale by municipalities across the globe. This study examines the motivation municipalities have for undertaking policies to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, when the theory of free-riding would predict that local administrations should find it difficult to unilaterally reduce their emissions for the benefit of the global climate. Through interviews with officials and/or staff in 23 municipalities in the United States enacting climate policy, data are gathered that suggest local government abatement policies are primarily a top–down decision based on what officials or staff members believe to be “good business” or rational policy choices. They are primarily driven by the potential for realised or perceived cost savings and co-benefits rather than by public pressure. Economic data from some dozen municipal projects are analyzed, finding, while municipalities lack sophisticated accounting techniques, some justification for the often-disputed claim that at least initial reductions in emissions can be made at cost savings. In the United States, with the lack of national abatement policies, it is municipalities that are leading the way in beginning to implement mitigation strategies, even if only for initial reductions.     

Negotiating Indigenous benefits from payment for ecosystem service (PES) schemes

This paper draws on research conducted with Aboriginal land managers across Northern Australia to show how and why payments for ecosystem service (PES) schemes should be framed around Indigenous rights to and relationships with their traditional estates. PES schemes offer opportunities to recognize and support Aboriginal communities' land and sea management knowledge and practices, and there is strong evidence that Indigenous communities are seeking to engage with such schemes. We focus on Aboriginal savanna landscape management, particularly traditional burning practices, to extend the ecosystem services framework to recognize Indigenous values and interactions with their lands as a critical service for Indigenous well-being. Drawing on case-study analysis of PES projects negotiated to support Aboriginal fire management programs across Northern Australia, we show how cultural ecosystem services can be applied to represent the active, dynamic and often interdependent relationships inherent in Indigenous human-environment relationships.     

从理念到行动：温室气体与局地污染物减排的协同效益与协同控制研究综述

自20世纪90年代IPCC提出协同效益概念以来,大量研究充分证实了温室气体减排政策、措施能产生可观的局地生态环境质量和健康效益。相应地,既有研究也证实局地大气污染物减排政策、措施对温室气体减排同样具有协同效益。中国进入工业化成熟期不久,局地大气污染压力即达到峰值,又迎头遭遇国际应对气候变化浪潮,同时面临空气污染物与温室气体双重减排压力。因此,国内研究不仅关注“由碳及污”或“由污及碳”的单向协同效益评估,更加重视对综合减排措施的协同效益评价。21世纪初,美国国家环保局提出的温室气体与局地大气污染物协同控制概念在中国得到更为广泛的欢迎和接受,并由中国学者首先定义了协同控制的内涵,认为协同控制是实现最大化协同效益的手段和途径。这一进展将人们对协同效益的认识提升到“全球视野、局地行动”的新高度,推动人们从被动地接受“协同效益”,转而主动寻求“协同控制”温室气体和局地大气污染物,为统筹全球和国内（局地）两个减排战场,提供了从认识论、方法论到实践论的全方位支持。中国学者在国内外协同效益、协同控制研究基础上,构建协同控制效应评价和协同控制路径规划方法,并通过多个行业、城市、区域的案例研究证实了该方法体系的科学性和可行性。“协同控制”也已上升成为国家应对气候变化和持续改善大气环境质量的重要策略。在中国推进美丽中国建设、实现碳达峰目标和碳中和愿景的过程中,协同控制的理念、措施、政策将发挥愈加重要的作用。未来,协同控制研究需要将所关注的对象要素,从仅局限于大气扩展至整个生态环境系统;而对建立协同控制的治理体系的研究,将成为实现宏观层面气候变化与生态环境治理协同的关键。     

Closing the emission price gap

Even without internationally concerted action on climate change mitigation, there are important incentives for countries to put a price on their domestic emissions, including public finance considerations, internalizing the climate impacts of their own emissions, and co-benefits, such as clean air or energy security. Whereas these arguments have been mostly discussed in separate strands of literature, this article carries out a synthesis that exemplifies how policies to put a price on emissions can be conceptualized in a multi-objective framework. Despite considerable uncertainty, empirical evidence suggests that different countries may face quite different incentives for emission pricing. For instance, avoided climate damages and co-benefits of reduced air pollution appear to be the main motivation for emission pricing in China, while for the US generating public revenue dominates and for the EU all three motivations are of intermediate importance. We finally argue that such unilateral incentives could form the basis for incremental progress in international climate negotiations toward a realistic climate treaty based on national interest and differentiated emission pricing and describe how such an agreement could be put into practice.