Analysis of the co-benefits of climate change mitigation

Abstract

Economic development of the poorer nations brings competing influences on public health. On the one hand, the increase in per capita wealth reduces susceptibility to environmental pollutants. On the other hand, industrialization may increase the emissions of those same pollutants. Global climate policy negotiations have recognized this conflict, striving to identify a pathway to decarbonize the global economy while allowing growth in world regions at the bottom of the economic pyramid. This chapter explores the conflict by developing a quantitative methodology for calculating the economic growth’s net impact on public health and the co-benefits of greenhouse gas reductions associated with exposure to particulate matter. The chapter shows that co-benefits of decarbonization are significant; GDP growth in non-Annex I nations carries its own health benefit; the co-benefits are in part reduced through the increase in GDP by between 12 % and 17 %; and failure to include economic growth projections into co-benefit calculations produces greater errors in co-benefit estimates as the stringency of climate policies is increased.