The Issue of Climate Change

According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) which aggregates international research efforts on climate change, global atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases (CO2, CH4 and N2O) have increased markedly as a results of human activities since 1750. As their concentrations in the atmosphere intensify, GHG act as a radiation trap that forces more energy to stay on surface and more heat to be produced, therefore causing global warming. According to the sensitivity projections of the IPCC, any commitment to limit the global average temperature increase within a +2 °C limit would force to stabilize CO2 concentration around 350–400 ppm. However, until damages are elicited and adaptation cost monetized, the urgency of taking measure against global warming remains for many elusive. This chapter will present the two clearest possible strategies to limit the causes of climate change and its impact, mitigation and adaptation strategies and details their respective strengths and weaknesses. We show that to be effective, an a optimal policy against climate changes and their impacts will have to combine both mitigation and adaptation. While adaptation are easier to implement, bear less uncertainties and can be privatized (partially avoiding free-riding effects), mitigation strategies are the only capable to reduce GHGs in the atmosphere in order to reestablish a viable long-term CO2 concentration.