Climate Action Team Report to Governor Schwarzenegger and the Legislature March 2006

Abstract

The report begins (Section 2) with an overview of the scientific evidence regarding climate change and its potential effects in California. Section 3 outlines the long history of previous actions that California has taken to understand and address the threat of climate change. Section 4 provides an overview of the scenario analysis that was done to evaluate the impacts of climate change on California, potential adaptation measures that can be taken to best respond to those impacts, and an economic assessment of the impacts. Section 5 presents the Climate Action Team recommendations regarding strategies the state should pursue to reduce climate change emissions. Section 6 outlines market-based options for the state and includes a discussion of design choices that need to be further evaluated prior to adoption of a market-based program for the state. Section 7 discusses all possible emission reduction implementation options that were considered by the Climate Action Team, including market-based options. Section 8 covers a broad assessment of the economic implications of state actions to reduce climate change emissions. Section 9 looks specifically at potential impacts on minority and low-income communities. Section 10 contains the Climate Action Team’s recommendations to the Governor and the Legislature.