Adaptation, Technology, and Financing Climate Change

On tonight's policy call, two members shared with us their research on issues pertaining to adaptation, technology transfer to developing countries, and financing climate change adaptation.

These three topics, though riddled with complexities, are intimately linked. All of them require the assistance of Annex 1 - or developed, industrialized countries - to assist poorer nations to adapt to climate change, either through finance mechanisms (e.g. taxes on emissions trading, % of GDP to climate change) or by sharing technology.

There is a huge gap in the predicted funding required for countries to avoid the worst impacts of climate change, and the amount of money that current mechanisms can provide. The UNFCCC estimated that adaptation costs will range between $28 - 67 billion per year by 2015. The UNDP suggests this range is closer to $50-86 billion annually. The current mechanisms are only expected to generate $80-300 million - an order of magnitude less than required - per year between now and 2012.

This huge gap is no small challenge. No developed country is willing to part with much of their cash. Canada, for instance, has pledged only $16 million to the Least Develoepd Countries Fund and the Special Climate Change Fund, which is a small contribution relative to other countries' contributions. They also refuse to spend any public funds on Clean Development Mechanisms, which are adaptation projects in developing countries that are funded by Annex 1 countries, in exchange for earning the carbon credits generated from the project. So for example, if India were to build a wind farm, Canada could fund the wind technology and installment, and claim the carbon credits generated by replacing coal energy with wind for Canadian emissions accounting.

On the technology side of things, the picture is no prettier. Technology transfer may have been believed by some to be a easy solution to a complicated problem. There are economists out there who feel that technology will continue to evolve to meet our needs and solve our challenges (known as the "Cornucopian" view). However, an article in Nature several months ago was cited in tonight's call that discussed the IPCC's vast underestimation of how quickly we are able to develop new technologies to bridge the gap and help nations adapt to climate change. Technology advancement would have to happen at "a massive rate" to catch up to the IPCCs projections. Unfortunately, this might be one challenge that technology can't develop fast enough to solve.

The discussions in Poznan around adaptation, technology and finance should be interesting, as there are many discrepancies between what the Global South needs, and what the Industrialized North is willing to give. as this is not my area of expertise, there won't be much more on this blog about adaptation. However, I will endeavor to post any highlights here, and direct potentially interested readers to good resources later on.