Climate change—mitigation and adaptation

Mitigation is action that reduces or prevents greenhouse gas emissions to limit the extent of future climate change.

Mitigation reduces greenhouse gas emissions (or removes CO2) to prevent climate change from getting worse.

Examples include renewable energy (solar/wind), nuclear power, energy efficiency, and smart grids.

CCS captures CO2 emissions (e.g., from power plants/industry) and stores the CO2 underground to prevent it entering the atmosphere.

Mitigation reduces the causes of climate change (emissions), while adaptation reduces vulnerability to its effects (impacts).

Carbon taxes, emissions trading (cap-and-trade), regulations/standards, and subsidies for renewables are common mitigation policy tools.

Examples include switching to renewable energy, improving energy efficiency, preventing deforestation, or electrifying transport.

Transport: electric vehicles or public transport. Agriculture: reduce meat consumption, improve livestock management, or reduce fertiliser use.

Deforestation removes a carbon sink (less photosynthesis) and often releases stored carbon when biomass is burned or decomposes.

Carbon removal is reducing atmospheric CO2 by increasing sinks or using technology (e.g., afforestation, carbon capture and storage, direct air capture).

It can be costly, slow to scale, and may create reliance on future technology rather than immediate emissions cuts; storage and monitoring also pose challenges.

Afforestation is planting trees where there were none recently. It is mitigation because trees absorb CO2 via photosynthesis, increasing carbon storage.

Common criteria include effectiveness, cost, feasibility, time scale, equity, and side effects/co-benefits.

Greenhouse gases mix globally, so emissions reductions in one country benefit everyone; effectiveness increases when many countries act together.

Conclude using your evaluation criteria (effectiveness, cost, feasibility, time scale, equity) and argue that a mix of strategies is usually needed.

Examples include sea walls/flood barriers, managed retreat, and wetland restoration as natural buffers.

Adaptation reduces vulnerability to climate impacts that are happening now or expected in the future.

Adaptation is action that reduces vulnerability to the actual or expected impacts of climate change.

Past emissions have locked in some warming because CO2 persists for a long time and oceans store heat, so impacts will continue.

Common criteria include effectiveness, cost, equity, sustainability, feasibility, and maladaptation risk.

Examples include drought-resistant crops, changing planting dates, efficient irrigation (drip), crop diversification, and agroforestry.

Maladaptation is when an adaptation strategy creates new problems or increases vulnerability elsewhere or in the long term.

Reactive adaptation responds after impacts occur; anticipatory adaptation prepares in advance for expected future impacts.

A monitoring and alert system that warns people about hazards (e.g., heatwaves, floods, storms, disease outbreaks) to reduce harm through preparedness.

Urban trees/green infrastructure, green roofs, reflective surfaces, and building design for passive cooling can reduce the urban heat island effect.

Planned adaptation is deliberate policy action by governments/organisations; autonomous adaptation is spontaneous adjustment by individuals or systems without coordinated policy.

Sea walls can protect one area but increase erosion and flooding risk down-coast, damaging habitats and shifting risk to other communities.

It increases freshwater supply in drought-prone areas (adaptation), but it is energy-intensive/expensive and produces salty brine waste.

Mitigation is preventing the fire (reducing emissions). Adaptation is installing smoke detectors/sprinklers (coping with impacts).

Adaptation benefits and costs are often uneven. Strategies should protect the most vulnerable groups, not only those with money and political power.

EVSs are worldviews that shape how individuals and societies perceive environmental issues and preferred solutions.

The UNFCCC is a global framework treaty aiming to stabilise greenhouse gas concentrations and coordinate international climate action.

UNFCCC (1992) → Kyoto Protocol (1997) → Paris Agreement (2015).

Support technology and market solutions such as carbon capture and storage, nuclear power, geoengineering, and carbon trading.

Kyoto set binding emission reduction targets for developed countries and included mechanisms such as carbon trading (e.g., Clean Development Mechanism).

It encourages wider participation because countries set their own targets, but ambition may be insufficient if targets are weak.

Free riders, short-term politics, and equity disputes between nations (who pays/cuts first) are common challenges (any two).

A Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) is a country’s self-set plan/target for reducing emissions and adapting to climate change under the Paris Agreement.

Emphasise lifestyle change and reduced consumption, renewable energy, local solutions, and living within planetary boundaries.

Cornucopian/technocentric perspectives often argue human ingenuity and innovation can overcome limits, so they favour technological fixes.

Countries are expected to strengthen their NDCs regularly (typically every 5 years) to increase ambition over time.

Ecocentric perspectives (soft/deep ecologist) are most likely to prioritise reduced consumption and systemic change.

A balanced judgement using criteria such as participation, ambition, enforcement/compliance, measurable outcomes, and fairness/finance.

Countries may free-ride because benefits are global, costs are local; enforcement is weak because agreements rely on national sovereignty and political will.

Describe how different EVSs prioritise different values (growth vs limits, tech vs behaviour), give examples of strategies each would support, then evaluate trade-offs.