Description
Synergies, trade-offs and conflicts exist between climate change adaptation and mitigation policies at multiple scales, which are not well understood. The EU sponsored ADAM (ADaptation And Mitigation) project aims at better understanding these interrelationships and assessing the extent to which existing and evolving EU (and world) mitigation and adaptation policies can achieve a tolerable transition (a ‘soft landing’) to a world with a global climate no warmer than 2°C above pre-industrial levels. The project attempts to identify the associated costs and effectiveness of such a mitigation target and assess the damages avoided compared to a scenario where climate change continues unchecked to 5°C. Another objective is to develop and appraise a portfolio of longer term strategic policy options that could contribute to addressing identified shortfalls both between existing mitigation policies and the achievement of the EU’s 2°C target, and between existing adaptation policy development and implied EU goals and targets for adaptation.

IIASA is leading two key work packages in ADAM:

Workpackage A2
The overarching objective of workpackage A2 is to contribute to the fundamental question underlying the post-2012 negotiations: What will be the economic costs of adapting to a 5°C change in climate versus a 2°C change? By quantifying current and future risks of extreme weather in the EU, and identifying the costs of structural/technological and other paths for adapting to extremes (retreat and living with the risks being other paths), this WP will provide an important piece of the puzzle underlying this post-2012 question. A further objective builds on the estimates of disaster damages and costs of prevention and asks how adaptation (prevention and risk transfer) can be mainstreamed into EU policies, for example, regional development, agriculture and disaster assistance. A third objective is to go beyond “normal disasters” to examine two difficult issues: Are there plausible climate-related stochastic events that lie beyond the limits of Europe’s willingness or ability to adapt, and how do we evaluate the risks? The second issue is Europe’s role in assisting developing countries, many of which are far more vulnerable to weather catastrophes. How can new forms of pro-active disaster support be mainstreamed into Europe’s current assistance policies?

Workpackage A2 presentation: Adaptation to extremes in Europe:Insights from the ADAM project

For more information, contact Reinhard Mechler

Workpackage P3b
The overarching objective of workpackage P3b is to provide strategic options to the EU and its
member countries for mainstreaming and restructuring development assistance, such that it promotes climate mitigation and adaptation in ways that are acceptable to the donor and recipient communities. The strategic options will be tested within ADAM’s Policy Appraisal Framework. Meeting this objective will require insights on the role of developing countries in the climate regime, as well as on the current effectiveness of mainstreaming development assistance.
Three sub-goals of this workpackage are thus:

• To provide insights on the broad issue of engaging developing countries into the climate change mitigation/adaptation regime (this objective will be carried out in close collaboration with the P3a Case Study on Post-2012 negotiations);
  
  
• To survey current EU practices in mainstreaming climate-change goals into development assistance; and,
  
  
• To assess the desirability and feasibility of mainstreaming EU development assistance to take account of climate goals in light of development assistance experience.

For more information, contact Anthony Patt

Funding Agency:
European Commission

Duration:
February 2009

Project co-ordinator:
Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research

IIASA Researchers:
Reinhard Mechler
Anthony Patt
Joanne Bayer
Stefan Hochrainer
Georg Pflug
Daniel Kull
Harvir Kalirai

Webpage: http://www.adamproject.eu

Responsible for this page: Jun Watabe
Last updated: 30 Jun 2008