Title: Economics of climate change mitigation and adaptation: moving from impact assessment to vulnerability

Authors: Sibananda Senapati; Vijaya Gupta

Addresses: National Institute of Industrial Engineering (NITIE), Vihar Lake Road, Mumbai 400087, Maharashtra, India. ' National Institute of Industrial Engineering (NITIE), Vihar Lake Road, Mumbai 400087, Maharashtra, India

Abstract: The article is based on a detailed literature review pertaining to conceptual and methodological issues of climate change impact and vulnerability assessment. The impact of climate change differs among geographical regions owing to the abject difference in the levels of income, production and consumption pattern, availability and use of technology, etc. The initial impact assessment studies, which were based on estimating economic costs of climate change, were limited to a certain extent in finding the diverse impacts at different regions. There are a number of measurement constraints in terms of scientific and economic uncertainties. Further, for a long time, the mitigation policy approach has received major academic attention in the climate change policy literature, whereas the adaptation approach is only entertained while conducting vulnerability assessment. Vulnerability assessment on the other hand is integrated in nature, covering a large research domain from risk hazard literature to poverty literature.

Keywords: climate change mitigation; climate change adaptation; economic costs; economic constraints; impact assessment; vulnerability assessment; literature review; economics.

DOI: 10.1504/IER.2012.047791

Interdisciplinary Environmental Review, 2012 Vol.13 No.2/3, pp.105 - 107

Published online: 16 Aug 2014 *

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