Climate change is one of the biggest challenges facing the world today. Its many effects – extreme temperatures, droughts, floods, and severe storms – have already affected, and will continue to affect, all important aspects of our lives and those of future generations. In response, societies have made adaptation and mitigation efforts at various scales (international, regional, national, and local). This article introduces the difference between two key strategies for addressing the challenges of climate change: climate change mitigation and adaptation, and the prospect of integrating the two into climate planning.
Mitigation is an attempt to reduce the causes of climate change. It is defined by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) as
a human intervention to reduce the sources or enhance the sinks of greenhouse gases (GHGs).
IPCC, 2014
In contrast to mitigation, which aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and other causes of climate change, adaptation involves changing how we live or work in response to changing climate conditions, such as more frequent or intense heatwaves, droughts, floods, or storms. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), adaptation is
the process of adjustment to actual or expected climate and its effects.
IPCC, 2014
Traditionally, mitigation and adaptation are viewed as separate issues, dealt with within different policy frameworks. However, due to increased awareness of the deep interconnections and inseparability of the two (Göpfert et al., 2019), there has been increased interest among scholars and practitioners in exploring the integration and joint management of these two dimensions of climate planning.
The argument for integrating adaptation and mitigation is primarily based on the potential synergies and co-benefits that could arise from such integration.
Synergies occur when the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. In the context of climate change adaptation and mitigation, synergies occur when joint management of the two leads to better outcomes than when they are managed separately (Landauer et al., 2019).
Co-benefits occur when efforts aimed at improving mitigation (or adaptation) result in additional positive adaptation (or mitigation) effects (Grafakos et al., 2019).
By adopting an integrated and holistic approach that considers both mitigation and adaptation, it is possible to leverage synergies and co-benefits while minimizing conflicts and trade-offs between the two (Grafakos et al., 2020). The next part of this article will explore the potential of this approach.
References:
Göpfert, C., Wamsler, C. & Lang, W., 2019. A framework for the joint institutionalization of climate change mitigation and adaptation in city administrations. Mitig Adapt Strateg Glob Change 24, 1–21. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11027-018-9789-9
Grafakos, S., Trigg, K., Landauer, M., Chelleri, L., Dhakal, S., 2019. Analytical framework to evaluate the level of integration of climate adaptation and mitigation in cities. Climatic Change, 154 (1–2), 87–106. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-019-02394-w
IPCC, 2014. Annex II: Glossary. In: Mach, K.J., Planton, S., von Stechow, C. (Eds.), Climate Change 2014: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Core Writing Team, R.K. Pachauri and L.A. Meyer (eds.)]. IPCC, Geneva, Switzerland, pp. 117–130.
Landauer,M., Juhola, S., Söderholm, M. (2015). Inter-relationships between adaptation and mitigation: a systematic literature review. Climatic Change 131 (4), 505–517. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-015-1395-1
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