This is a list of foreign reports about economic analyses of climate adaptation. The reports are listed in chronological order.


Socio-economic Screening of Climate Change Adaptation - SUMMARY (Pdf)
This screening looks at climate adaptation across the 14 sectors dealt with in the government’s climate change adaptation strategy from 2008. The objective of the screening is to give an overall picture of the magnitude of the climate change impacts and the associated damage costs or benefits, and possible adaption measures at play in the sectors. The screening also relates to whether adaptation can take place within the existing regulatory framework.

Climate change impacts in Europe. Final report of the PESETA research project
EUR Number: 24093 EN
European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC) 2009

Global warming could cost Europe up to €65 billion a year, the final report of the PESETA project says. If the climate expected in the 2080s occurred today, the EU would face yearly GDP losses between €20 and €65 billion, depending on the temperature increase in Europe (2.5°C to 5.4°C). This result takes into account four aspects that are highly sensitive to climate changes: agriculture, river flooding, coastal systems and tourism. The study also looked at different regional impacts of climate change across the EU. Damages would occur mainly in Southern and Central Europe, while Northern Europe would be the sole region with net economic benefits, mainly driven by the positive effects in agriculture.


Shaping Climate-resilient Development. A Framework for Decision-making
ECA Economics of Climate Adaptation 2009

A study by the Economics of Climate Adaptation Working Group, a partnership between the Global Environment Facility, McKinsey & Company, Swiss Re, the Rockefeller Foundation, ClimateWorks Foundation, the European Commission, and Standard Chartered Bank.

The report focuses on the economic aspects of adaptation, it outlines a fact-based risk management approach that decision-makers can use to understand the impact of climate on their economies – and identify actions to minimize that impact at the lowest cost to society.


Economics of Adaptation to Climate Change
World Bank 2009

The report estimates that it will cost the developing countries $75 - $100 billion each year to adapt to climate change from 2010 to 2050. This is under the assumption that the temperature will increase by 2°C by in 2050.


An Analysis of Adaptation as a Response to Climate Change
Copenhagen Consensus Center 2009

Adaptation responses are split into three different categories: reactive, proactive and investments in innovation. The size, timing, relative contribution to climate damage reduction, and the benefit-cost ratios of each of these strategies is assessed for the world as a whole, and for developed and developing countries. The study also takes into account the role of price signals and markets. The study concludes that adaptation is an effective means of reducing climate-related damages. The benefit-cost ratios of adaptation expenditure are larger than one in all scenarios, and for high and low climate damages and discount rates. Nonetheless, benefit-cost ratios are even larger when adaptation and mitigation are implemented jointly. Most adaptation expenditures need to be carried out in developing countries.


Strategies to Adapt to an Uncertain Climate Change
Global Environ. Change 2009
Hallegate S., 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2008.12.003
The report costs money.

Future infrastructure should be made more robust to possible changes in climate conditions. This aim implies that users of climate information must change their decision-making frameworks, for instance by adapting the uncertainty-management methods they currently apply to exchange rates or R&D outcomes. Five methods are examined: (i) selecting “no-regret” strategies; (ii) favouring reversible and flexible options; (iii) buying “safety margins” in new investments; (iv) promoting soft adaptation strategies; and (v) reducing decision time horizons. Moreover, it is essential to consider both negative and positive side-effects and externalities of adaptation measures. Adaptation–mitigation interactions also call for integrated design and assessment of adaptation and mitigation policies, which are often developed by distinct communities.


Economic Aspect of Adaptation to Climate Change: Integrated Asessement Modelling of Adaptation Costs and Benefits
Kelly de Bruin, Rob Dellink og Shardul Agrawala
OECD Environment Working Papers No. 6, OECD 2009

Efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions need to move hand in hand with adaptation policies. The report seeks to inform critical questions with regard to policy mixes of investments in adaptation and mitigation, and how they might vary over time. Adaptation cost curves are estimated for the world, as well as for specific regions. The policy simulations show that the costs of inaction are high, and thus it is important to start acting on both mitigation and adaptation now.


Assessing Climate Change Impacts, Sea level Rise and Storm Surge Risk in Port Cities: A Case Study on Copenhagen
Hallegate S. et al
OECD Environment Working Papers, No. 3 OECD 2008

With current defences most of Copenhagen is protected against all possible storm surges. An exception is the south western part of the agglomeration (including the stretch in Hvidovre), which is only protected against the 120-yr event. The current defences are able to face significant sea level rise, but upgrades will be needed in a few decades in some important locations, including the harbour and the city historical centre. The costs of upgrades are significant lower than the avoided damage costs. The upgrades need to be anticipated well in advance. Even with adequate defences, sea level rise will increase flood exposure, magnifying the consequences of any defence failure. This increase in exposure will make it even more necessary to carefully maintain the defences and to create effective disaster emergency and recovery plans. Adaptation and upgrades in flood defences are the most efficient tools to reduce sea level rise losses over the short and medium terms. Over the long term, however, only mitigation can limit sea level rise to levels that are manageable with dikes and sea walls.


Economic Aspects of Adaptation to Climate Change
Costs, Benefits and Policy Instruments
OECD 2008
Free download of summary, but the whole report costs money.

The report provides an assessment of adaptation costs and benefits in key climate sensitive sectors, as well as at national and global levels. It moves the discussion beyond cost estimation to the potential and limits of economic and policy instruments - including insurance and risk sharing, environmental markets and pricing, and public private partnerships - that can be used to motivate adaptation actions. The report cautions that recent headline estimates on the global price-tag for adaptation face serious limitations. In addition, the few available studies have tended to stack upon the assumptions made in preceding studies. Therefore, a consensus, even in order of magnitude terms, is premature and may be misleading. The report calls for a raft of policy instruments to establish the right incentives to ensure that adaptation is timely, well-informed and efficient. Setting up the right incentive and partnership structures to promote adaptation, however, will be a daunting
task.  Adaptation to climate change as a public policy challenge has only just emerged.


Costs of Inaction on Environmental on Environmental Policy Challenges: Summary Report, OECD 2008
The report summarises available evidence on the costs of inaction in four key areas, including climate change. The existing literature suggests very strongly that the costs of policy inaction in selected areas can be considerable -- in some cases, representing a significant “drag” on OECD economies. Although OECD governments have, for many years, developed policies to address these challenges, much work remains to be done. In particular, work should be intensified to reduce some of the uncertainties involved in defining and measuring the marginal costs of inaction, so that eventual comparisons with the marginal costs of action can be as robust as possible.


The Economics of Climate Change Impacts and Policy Benefits at City Scale: A Conceptual Framework
Hallegate S. et al
OECD Environment Working Papers, No. 4 OECD 2008

The report explores the city-scale risks of climate change and the local benefits of both adaptation policies and (global) mitigation strategies. The report stresses the need for global macroeconomic projections and projections of emission of greenhouse and investigates how to develop regional climate forecast from the global forecast by using specific downscaling methods. The report is one in a series under the OECD Environment Directorate’s project on Cities and Climate Change.


Estimating the Economic Cost of Sea-Level Rise
Masahiro Sugiyama, Robert J. Nicholls and Athanasios Vafeidis
MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Clobal Change,  Report No. 156 2008

The report generalizes the sea-level rise cost function and applies it to a new database on coastal vulnerability (DIVA). An analytic expression for the generalized sea-level rise cost function is obtained to explore the effect of various spatial distributions of capital and nonlinear sea-level rise scenarios. The new equation reduces the estimated damage and protection fraction through discounting of the costs in later periods. The effect of capital concentration substantially decreases protection cost and capital loss compared with previous studies, but not wetland loss. The use of a nonlinear sea-level rise scenario further reduces the total cost because the cost is postponed into the future.


Climate Chance Impacts and Adaptation Strategies in Italy An Economic Assessment
Carlo Carraro and Alessandra Sgobbi
Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei  2008
Working paper 6 2008

The economic value of the impacts of climate change is assessed for different Italian economic sectors and regions. Sectoral and regional impacts are then aggregated to provide a macroeconomic estimate of variations in GDP induced by climate change in the next decades. Autonomous adaptation induced by changes in relative prices and in stocks of natural and economic resources is fully taken into account. The model also considers international trade effects. Results show that in Italy aggregate GDP losses induced by climate change are likely to be small. However, some economic sectors (e.g. tourism) and the alpine regions will suffer significant economic damages.



Appraising the Socio-economic Impacts of Climate Change for Finland
Finnish Environment Institute 2007
FINADAPT Working Paper 12

The report discusses the economic evaluation of climate change impacts and adaptation.It presents a preliminary attempt at assessing the costs and benefits of climate change, using results from FINADAPT and from the published literature. It then discusses some of the priority issues for improving economic appraisal in the future.


Climate Change in the European Alps
Adapting Winter Tourism and Natural Hazards Management
OECD 2007
Free download of summary, but the whole report costs money.

The report examines the implications of climate change for the economies in the European Alps. It focuses on adaptation measures to address two key vulnerabilities: increasing losses in winter tourism due to reduced snow cover, and increased exposure of settlements and infrastructure to natural hazards. Three countries are included in the study: France, Switzerland and Austria. Technological and behavioural adaptation measures, together with institutional structures and risk transfer mechanisms, are also reviewed.


Climate Change: The Cost of Inaction and the Cost of Adaptation
European Environment Agency
EEA Technical report No 13/2007

The report reviews, analyses and discusses the methodological issues regarding cost of inaction and cost of adaptation to climate change modelling. It also analyses possible cost impacts of climate change in the European economic sectors.


Ranking of the World’s Cities Most Exposed to Coastal Flooding Today and in the Future (Summary)
OECD Environment Working Papers No. 1, OECD 2007
Ranking of the World’s Cities Most Exposed to Coastal Flooding Today and in the Future (The full report)
OECD Environment Working Papers No. 1, OECD 2007

Climate change could triple population at risk from coastal flooding by 2070. The study analyses the exposure of people and property and infrastructure to a 1-in-100 year flood event in over 130 key port cities worldwide. A 1-in-100 year flood event is a commonly accepted risk assessment standard. The study aims to help policy makers determine where to focus adaptation strategies to climate extremes and to understand the potential benefits of mitigation policy. It is the first in a series of OECD reports looking at the economic impact of climate change on cities. 

The Routeplanner report
Ierland, E.C. van et al
Wageningen University 2007

The Routeplanner project aims to provide a ‘qualitative assessment’ of the direct and indirect effects of adaptation options and to provide an assessment of some of the costs and benefits of adaptation options in the Netherlands. The study is the result of a policy oriented project that took place between May and September 2006. The present report presents and summarizes the results of all phases of the study: an inventory of adaptation options, a qualitative assessment of the effects of the adaptation options for the Netherlands in the long run, a database which allows to rank the various options according to a set of criteria and a relative ranking on the basis of these criteria. Finally the report also contains the best available information on costs and benefits of various adaptation options.

Economy-Wide Estimates of the Implication of Climate Chance: A Joint Analysis for Sea Level Rise and Tourism
Andrea Bigano, Francesco Bosello, Roberto Roson, Richard S.J. Tol
FEEM Working Paper No. 135.2006 og CMCC Research Paper No. 05
Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei  2006

The report focuses on the economic assessment of two specific climate change impacts: sea-level rise and changes in tourism flows. By using a CGE model the two impacts categories are first analyzed separately and then jointly. Comparing the results it is shown that, even though qualitatively joint effects follow the outcomes of the disjoint exercises, quantitatively impact interaction do play a significant role. It has also been possible to disentangle the relative contribution of each single impact category to the final result. Demand shocks induced by changes in tourism flows outweigh the supply side shock induced by the loss of coastal land.


Cost of Policy Inaction
Scoping study for DG Environment
Jan Bakkes et al
Netherlands Environmental Agancy in association with Institute European Environmentla Policy GHK and Amstardam Universitet 2006

Cost of Policy Inaction is defined as the damage occurring in the absence of additional policy or policy revision. The study portrays COPI as an instrument that can typically be used in the early phases in policy development, when the emphasis is on identifying problems, warning and communicating the need for policy action. It can also perhaps sketch the urgency relative to other issues. Furthermore, COPI is able to indicate what sectors need to take action; however, it is not suitable for comparing and choosing between different policy options, or for judging on the efficiency of policies. COPI would seem to be a powerful tool for these early phases, formulating a head-on statement of the problem and spelling this out in economic terms. The study identifies a number of areas where it would make sense to apply the COPI concept.


A Cost-Benefit Analysis of the New Orleans Flood Protection System
Hallegate S.
Regulatory Analysis 06-02 AEI-Brookings Joint Center, 2006

The report stresses the high sensitivity of a CBA recommendation to several uncertain assumptions, highlight the importance of second-order costs and damage heterogeneity in welfare losses, and show how climate change creates an additional layer of uncertainty in infrastructure design that increases the probability of either under-adaptation (and increased risk) or over-adaptation (and sunk costs).


Climate Adaptation: Risk, Uncertainty and Decision-Making
UKCIP Technical Report 2003
R. Willows and R. Connell, R. (eds.)

The report provides a step-by-step decision-making framework to help planners, businesses and government assess the risk posed by climate change, and work out how best to respond.