Transcript section home - Cambridge Centre for Climate Change Mitigation

Understanding climate change science and
policy: Policy
Prof Douglas Crawford-Brown
Director
Cambridge Centre for Climate Change Mitigation Research
Remember the components that might be the focus of policy…
Copenhagen and Cancun expanded climate policy
Reduce
energy need
Increase
efficiency
Climate Change
Risk Mitigation
Ecosystem
storage
Reduce
Emissions
Reduce
Concentration
Low carbon
energy
Capture and
storage
Reduce
vulnerability
Improve
response
Reduce
Temperature
Reduce
Risk
Air
“cleansing”
Decrease
insolation
The policy challenge…
Find a policy such that it will produce (i) an
acceptable level of risk from climate change, (ii)
in an acceptable fraction of the world’s
population, and (iii) do so with the desired level
of confidence…
…and demonstrate that it is amongst the more
cost-effective solutions to risk reduction
In the UK, we lead the world in setting targets…
Percent of Carbon Emissions Normalized to
2007
Carbon Dioxide Reduction Scenario Summary
120
100
Alpha
Beta
80
Gamma
60
Delta
Epsilon
40
Zeta
Reference
20
Target
0
2000
2010
2020
2030
2040
2050
2060
Time (Year)
…but we are rubbish at hitting them (Why??).
Who is most vulnerable?
Mitigate or adapt?
Energy, economics and health
Coupled economic sectors, coupled regions
From polices to action plans and instruments
• Policies – broad statements of the intent of action (e.g. to reduce the
risk of climate change by remaining below 2 degrees C mean global
temperature increase)
• Strategies – more concrete statements of how a policy will be
implemented (e.g. through the policy instrument of a carbon tax applied
globally)
• Action Plans – the specific steps that will be taken to implement a
strategy (e.g. introduce carbon taxes starting at £20 per ton of carbon in
2020)