Prevention for Mitigation – Terrascope Mission 2021

Does prevention constitute an effective mitigation of an issue’s ensuing negative consequences? Can proactive measures in combating climate change definitively alleviate the risks threatening coastal communities in these coming decades? Yes and yes.

The mission presented to Terrascope 2021 calls for preparation of coastal communities to mitigate the harmful effects of climate change. In order for our mitigation plan to even be plausible, however, mitigation of climate change itself must be pursued as a solution. In worst case scenarios provided by the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the changing climate will have morphed today’s environment into an entirely uninhabitable world.

Long-term mitigation of harmful climate change effects relies on severe reduction of greenhouse gas emission rates over the course of the century, with a focus on reduction of carbon dioxide emissions. The American Meteorological Society identified CO2 as the primary long-term cause of global warming effects in their climate change statement, citing fossil fuel combustion and deforestation as the main causes of carbon dioxide concentration increases.^[1] At this point in time, with the estimated rates of increasing carbon dioxide atmospheric volume, coastal communities are not in a place where preparation efforts are technically or financially feasible without taking preventative measures against climate change itself. According to National Geographic, instantaneously stopping all carbon dioxide emissions overnight would still result in a global temperature rise between 0.5 and 1.0 degrees celsius due to high existing concentrations.^[2] NASA’s Earth Observatory reinforces this statistic, stating that abrupt carbon dioxide atmospheric volume stabilization would still result in a global temperature rise of approximately 0.6 degrees celsius.^[3]

Emission Scenarios of the IPCC Special Report on Emission Scenarios [4]
A1: The A1 storyline and scenario family describes a future world of very rapid economic growth, global population that peaks in mid-century and declines thereafter, and the rapid introduction of new and more efficient technologies. The three A1 groups are distinguished by their technological emphasis: fossil-intensive (A1FI), non-fossil energy sources (A1T) or a balance of all sources (A1B).
A2: The A2 storyline’s underlying theme is self-reliance and preservation of local identities. Population continuously increases, economic development is primarily regionally oriented, and per capita economic and technological growth are slower than in other storylines.
B1: The B1 storyline describes a convergent world similar to the A1 storyline, but with rapid change in economic structures toward a service and information economy, with reductions in material intensity and the introduction of clean and resource-efficient technologies. The emphasis is on global solutions to economic, social and environmental sustainability, including improved equity, but without additional climate initiatives.
B2: The B2 storyline describes a world with local solutions to economic, social and environmental sustainability. Population continuously increases at a rate lower than A2. It hosts intermediate levels of economic development, with less rapid and more diverse technological change than in the B1 and A1 storylines.
All six scenario groups, A1B, A1FI, A1T, A2, B1 and B2, should be considered equally sound.

More realistically, this coming century could see anywhere from a 1.8 to 4.0 degree celsius increase in global temperature, depending on how drastically we change our emission behaviors. In the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) fossil-intensive future temperature prediction, the rise in temperature may range anywhere from 2.4 to 6.4 degrees celsius. For reference, a six degree celsius temperature increase has been characterized by National Geographic as “the doomsday scenario,” where “oceans become marine wastelands, deserts expand and catastrophic events become more common.” Even global temperature increases ranging from three to four degrees celsius depict futures with ice-free Arctic summers and once-temperate regions made inhabitable.^[2]

Source: NASA Earth Observatory^[5]

We identify prevention as a necessary action for climate change preparation because not doing so would constitute disregard of worst case scenarios. Global warming to the magnitude of six degrees celsius, for example, would undermine the entirety of our preparations for coastal communities. IPCC’s 2012 assessment stated that sea levels could rise anywhere from 28 to 98 centimeters by the year 2100, depending on variances of greenhouse gas emissions; scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), meanwhile, have predicted sea level rises on the magnitude of meters.

In the case of Cambridge, MA, and particular the Area 2/MIT region, elevation above sea level ranges primarily between one and six meters. The majority of the MIT campus itself actually rests under the three meter elevation mark.^[6] Preparation to mitigate climate change effects is necessary for the survival of all at-risk coastal communities; preventative measures are consequently necessary to ensure that the environmental situation does not worsen so degeneratively that even the most drastic mitigation measures prove insufficient to protect these communities.

We note this not to overemphasize the negative externalities of climate change, but rather to stress the extent of mitigation which would have totakeplace in order to protect against these effects without emission reduction and thus substantial changes in energy production, industrial processing, and transportation systems. With a combination of prevention and mitigation tactics over the remainder of the century, coastal communities have the chance to thrive in this rapidly changing climate.

By Jen Fox

References

1. Climate Change – An Information Statement of the American Meteorological Society. (2012, August 20). Retrieved November 25, 2017, from https://www.ametsoc.org/ams/index.cfm/about-ams/ams-statements/statements-of-the-ams-in-force/climate-change/

2. About Six Degrees Could Change The World – NatGeoTV. (2007). Retrieved November 25, 2017, from http://natgeotv.com/ca/six_degrees/about

3. NASA Earth Observatory – How much more will Earth warm? Retrieved November 25, 2017, from https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/GlobalWarming/page5.php

4. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – Projections of Future Changes in Climate. (2007). Retrieved November 25, 2017, from https://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/spmsspm-projections-of.html

5. NASA Earth Observatory – How much more will Earth warm? Retrieved November 25, 2017, from https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/GlobalWarming/page5.php

6. Boston. (2017). Retrieved November 25, 2017, from http://en-us.topographic-map.com/places/Boston-8144013/