Climate Change

Topic Box from the 2006 Sixth Annual Benchmark Report

Long-term trends from 1950 to 2000 show increasing temperatures throughout the province, with average minimum daily temperatures increasing at a faster rate than maximums, and winter and spring temperatures rising faster than those in the summer. Temperature increases have been more pronounced in the interior than in the coastal areas. Throughout the province, this has created milder year round weather, with fewer days of frost and longer growing seasons. Research also shows that patterns of rainfall are changing across the province, with the Okanagan and North Coast having increasingly wetter springs but the South Coast's precipitation patterns remaining relatively constant over the past 50 years.

The economic costs of mitigating human-induced climate change are high and concentrated in the short term, while possible benefits occur in the long-run and are diffused over both time and physical area. One 2001 report estimated the cost of achieving the Kyoto target in reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions would be $120 per tonne CO2 equivalent emission and would necessitate a 10 to 100 percent increase in electricity prices, 60 percent increase in natural gas prices and 50 percent increase for gasoline. Canada's emphasis on voluntary initiatives to reduce emissions in the past has been evaluated as both environmentally ineffective and economically inefficient. A 2004 study suggested that the government pursue sector-specific, market driven regulations such as requiring a minimum market share for low-emission technologies and energy forms, or setting maximum emissions for major industries, implemented with flexibility over time.

Adaptation, in the context of climate change, refers to activities that minimize the negative impacts of climate change or encourage the development of new opportunities that may arise in the changed environment. While mitigation strategies are necessarily global in scale, adaptation can and should be managed at the local level, as different strategies will be most effective in different affected locales. A recent report suggests that Canada as a whole faces significant adaptation costs related to adapting infrastructure – roads, bridges and water-related, due to the impacts of rising sea levels. However, planning for and adapting to predicted climate changes can have a substantial economic benefit. For example, one study predicts that if adaptation measures are implemented correctly in agriculture in Canada, they have the potential to turn a projected loss of $2.5 billion into a gain of $10 billion.

Managing the economic impacts of climate change will be a long run, international exercise. A recent UK review predicts the costs of inaction on climate change to be the equivalent of at least 5% of global GDP per year by 2050, while the costs of stabilizing emissions at a rate that is feasible and which would limit adaptation and social costs and economic growth effects is equivalent to 1% of world GDP per year. Capping emissions at the 500-550 ppm CO2e level recommended, though immediate action, will limit the rise in average temperatures to 2 to 3°C. Policy suggestions to curtail emissions to meet this target include: establishment and implementation of carbon pricing and trading; support of R&D for low-carbon, efficient technologies; public information and minimum standards for energy products; and, adaptation based on high quality, forward looking climate information.

Sources: BC Ministry of Environment (2006) BC Coast and Marine Environment Project, Climate Change section, pages 11&13; Mark Jaccard (2001) Costing Greenhouse Gas Abatement – Canada's Technological and Behavioural Potential, Isuma, Vol. 2, No. 4., Winter; Mark Jacard, Nic Rivers and Matt Horne (2004), The Morning After – Optimal Greenhouse Gas Policies for Canada's Kyoto Obligations and Beyond, CD Howe Institute Commentary No. 197, March. Nicholas Stern (2006) Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change, The HM Treasury, Government of the United Kingdom.