1.3 CAN WE COMBAT CLIMATE CHANGE?

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Even if we stopped emitting greenhouse gases now, due to the complexity of the climate system, changes in the climate would continue for many years.

There is therefore a need to prepare for this change and adapt our environment and the way we go about our lives (infrastructure, lifestyle, etc) to cope with effects of climate change that are already inevitable but not unmanageable. This is known as adaptation.

However, continued carbon emissions at or above the current rate will very likely induce much larger climatic changes than those observed in 20th century and the first years of this new millennium. It is therefore essential that to lessen the impact of climate change in the long term and lessen consequently the need for far more drastic adaptation, we begin to make real inroads to reducing those emissions now. This is known as mitigation.

Adaptation

Essentially, adaptation concerns implementing policies and actions that will ensure countries, regions, districts,individual organisations and each one of us have sufficient capacity to respond and adapt to the impacts of climate change. Examples of adaptation include the design and construction of buildings with deeper and/or raised foundations to prevent subsidence and minimise the risk of flooding and which are capable of providing a comfortable environment during higher temperatures without the need for mechanical cooling and air-conditioning. These measures will reduce significantly our vulnerability to climate change.

However adaptation will have bounds in terms of social and economic acceptability and in this sense there are likely to be political limits to the extent of coping. Inevitably, the costs of adaptation will increase as the impacts on the environment worsen. The Government commissioned Stern Report (2006) was very clear on this point and emphasised that money spent now in reducing carbon emissions to 'safe' levels would be a fraction of that required to adapt in the future if we carried on with 'business as usual'.

Mitigation

In order to reduce the rate of change to manageable (and ultimately sustainable levels), it is therefore necessary to very significantly reduce the amount of carbon emissions we are presently releasing into the atmosphere. Studies from the IPCC show that if adequate policies were implemented, a significant reduction of carbon emissions could be achieved which should stand to stabilise the climate in the long term.

Mitigation measures include:

  • The promotion of lifestyles less dependant on fossil fuels - making choices that release less carbon;
  • Using energy more efficiently - reducing waste and avoidable losses;
  • Developing widespread implementation of renewable energy technologies as alternatives to fossil fuels.

If we reduce our carbon emissions to levels which do not exceed the limits of global systems to reabsorb them we can therefore limit the impact that these are having on the climate and seek to re-establish a more stable climate regime. However, this can only be achieved if we are all working together.

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