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In this paper, a demand-driven growth model is used to explore climate change scenarios faced by the South African economy. The focus is on key macroeconomic variables including employment, productivity, income distribution, trade, and fiscal balances. Results show that emission reduction alone will not put South Africa on a sustainable and equitable growth path. Expansionary macroeconomic policies are necessary. We show that, under sufficient global mitigation, expansionary fiscal and monetary policies lead to faster output and productivity growth, higher employment, and lower inequality. By contrast, macroeconomic tightening or "free riding" on global emission reduction lead to inferior outcomes, putting sustainable development out of reach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interaction between mitigation and adaptation is a key question for the design of climate policies. In this paper, we study how land use adaptation to climate change impacts land use competition in the agriculture, forest and other land use (AFOLU) sector and how a mitigation policy in agriculture might affect this competition. We use for this purpose two sector-specific bio-economic models of agriculture and forest combined with an econometric land use shares model to simulate the impacts of two climate change scenarios (A2 and B1, 2100 horizon), and a greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture policy consisting of a tax of between 0 and 200 €/tCO 2 equivalent. Our results show that both climate change scenarios lead to an increase in the area devoted to agriculture at the expense of forest which could have a negative impact on reducing greenhouse gas emissions responsible for climate change. The mitigation policy would curtail agricultural expansion, and thus could counteract the effects of land use adaptation to climate change. In other words, accounting for land use competition results in a reduction of the abatement costs of the mitigation policy in the agricultural sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ambitious goals to limit global warming can only be reached with a broad acceptance and participation of the general public. This paper relies on surveys among citizens in China, Germany and the U.S. and investigates the determinants of the acceptance of national and international adaptation and mitigation efforts. The empirical findings indicate that specific beliefs and environmental awareness are important drivers in all three countries, while political attitudes and socio-economic characteristics are the main sources of cross-country heterogeneity. The study thereby points at important starting points and target groups for raising the acceptance of national and international climate policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Concerns about climate change are growing, and so is the demand for information about the costs and benefits of mitigating greenhouse gas emissions. This paper seeks to estimate the benefits of climate change mitigation, as measured by the public's willingness to pay for such policies. We investigate the preferences of Italian and Czech households towards climate change mitigation policy options directly related to residential energy use. We use discrete choice experiments, which are administered in a standardized fashion to representative samples in the two countries through computer-assisted web interviews. Our preferred estimates of the willingness to pay per ton of CO 2 emissions avoided is €133 for the Italians and €94 Euro for the Czech respondents (at 2014 purchasing power parity). We find evidence of considerable heterogeneity in WTP driven by income. The two samples differ in their within-sample income elasticities of WTP, but comparison across the two countries suggests an income elasticity of WTP of one—or even greater than one for certain mixed logit specifications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change is one of the most daunting challenges human kind has ever faced. In the paper, we provide a survey of the micro and macro economics of climate change from a complexity science perspective and we discuss the challenges ahead for this line of research. We identify four areas of the literature where complex system models have already produced valuable insights: (i) coalition formation and climate negotiations, (ii) macroeconomic impacts of climate-related events, (iii) energy markets and (iv) diffusion of climate-friendly technologies. On each of these issues, accounting for heterogeneity, interactions and disequilibrium dynamics provides a complementary and novel perspective to the one of standard equilibrium models. Furthermore, it highlights the potential economic benefits of mitigation and adaptation policies and the risk of under-estimating systemic climate change-related risks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The literature on metrics to measure contributions to climate change from emissions of different greenhouse gases divides into studies that highlight physical aspects and studies that show the importance of economic factors. This paper distinguishes the physical aspects and implications of economic factors by asking what is demanded from physically based metrics if used for a specific policy objective. We study the aim of maximizing the welfare of emissions generated by consumption when there is a limit to the increase in global mean temperature. In that case, metrics ought to change over time, with increasing weight on short-living gases before the temperature limit is met. Metrics for short-living gases increase also with increasing uncertainty. Adjustments to new information spur higher metrics for short-living gases if it reduces the expected allowable emissions before the target is met, and lower metrics in the opposite case. Under a binding target, metrics refer to the instantaneous impact on radiative forcing multiplied by the lifetime of the respective gases, and adjusted by the attitude to risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change and its consequences present one of the most important threats to biodiversity and the functions of ecosystems. The stress on biodiversity is far beyond the levels imposed by the natural global climatic changes occurring in the recent evolutionary past. It includes temperature increases, shifts of climate zones, melting of snow and ice, sea level rise, droughts, floods, and other extreme weather events. Natural systems are vulnerable to such changes due to their limited adaptive capacity. Based on an analysis using the DPSIR framework, this paper discusses some of the important socio-economic driving forces of climate change, with a focus on energy use and transportation. The paper also analyses observed and potential changes of climate and the pressures they exert on biodiversity, the changes in biodiversity, the resulting impacts on ecosystem functions, and possible policy responses. The latter can be divided into mitigation and adaptation measures. Both strategies are needed, mitigation in order to stabilise the greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere, and adaptation in order to adjust to changes that have already occurred or cannot be avoided. One mitigation option, increased biofuel production, which is also a response to oil depletion, would change land use patterns and increase human appropriation of net primary production of biomass, thereby threatening biodiversity. By considering the first order and second order impacts of climate change on biodiversity when developing policy measures, it will be possible to integrate ecosystem and biodiversity protection into decision-making processes. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This paper discusses the interplay between the choice of the discount rate, greenhouse gas mitigation and endogenous technological change. Neglecting the issue of uncertainty it is shown that the Green Golden Rule stock of atmospheric carbon is uniquely determined, but is not affected by technological change. More generally it is shown analytically within the framework of a reduced model of integrated assessment that the optimal stationary stocks of atmospheric carbon depend on the choice of the discount rate, but are independent of the stock of technological knowledge. These results are then reinforced numerically in a fully specified integrated assessment analysis. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Assessing the benefits of climate policies is complicated due to ancillary benefits: abatement of greenhouse gases also reduces local air pollution. The timing of the abatement measures influences both the economic costs and ancillary benefits. This paper conducts efficiency analysis of ten alternative timing strategies, taking into account the ancillary benefits. We apply the approach by Kuosmanen and Kortelainen [Valuing Environmental Factors in Cost-Benefit Analysis Using Data Envelopment Analysis, Ecological Economics 62 (2007), 56–65], which does not require prior valuation of the environmental impacts. The assessment is based on synthetic data from a dynamic applied general equilibrium model calibrated to The Netherlands. Our assessment shows that if one is only interested in GHG abatement at the lowest economic cost, then equal reduction of GHGs over time is preferred. If society is willing to pay a premium for higher ancillary benefits, an early mid-intensive reduction strategy is optimal. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The objective of this paper is to assess the economic impacts of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by decreasing industrial output in Canada to a level that will meet the target set out in the Kyoto Protocol. The study uses an ecological–economic Input–Output model combining economic components valued in monetary terms with ecologic components – GHG emissions – expressed in physical terms. Economic and greenhouse gas emissions data for Canada are computed in the same sectoral disaggregation. Three policy scenarios are considered: the first one uses the direct emission coefficients to allocate the reduction in industrial output, while the other two use the direct plus indirect emission coefficients. In the first two scenarios, the reduction in industrial sector output is allocated uniformly across sectors while it is allocated to the 12 largest emitting industries in the last one. The estimated impacts indicate that the results vary with the different allocation methods. The third policy scenario, allocation to the 12 largest emitting sectors, is the most cost effective of the three as the impacts of the Kyoto Protocol reduces Gross Domestic Product by 3.1% compared to 24% and 8.1% in the first two scenarios. Computed economic costs should be considered as upper-bounds because the model assumes immediate adjustment to the Kyoto Protocol and because flexibility mechanisms are not incorporated. The resulting upper-bound impact of the third scenario may seem to contradict those who claim that the Kyoto Protocol would place an unbearable burden on the Canadian economy. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]