Economic impacs of climate mitigationhealth co-benefits and agricultural impacts

Abstract

The transition to low carbon economies is one of the most urgent challenges society needs to face in order to prevent and reduce the harmful effects of climate change. Every mitigation strategy requires the energy system to be substantially transformed. Additionally, changing the energy systems has a diverse range of associated co-benefits and side effects, with substantial economic implications, that are not usually integrated in policy design.The aim of this PhD thesis is to analyze air pollution driven co-effects of different climate change scenarios and mitigation options, with a special focus on health and agriculture by developing an innovative methodology which combines the use of an integrated assessment model (GCAM), an air quality model (TM5-FASST) and economic valuations methods.Chapter 2 analyzes air pollution driven damages in crop yields and the resulting effects on agricultural markets of a scenario where there is no climate policy established. Afterward, Chapter 3 examines which are the implications of reverting current fossil fuels subsidies into clean solar technologies in terms of air pollution. Then, the subsequent chapters analyze health co-benefits associated to different transition pathways. While Chapter 4 estimates the potential co-benefits of achieving both the 2°C and the 1.5°C objectives following different burden-sharing criteria, Chapter 5 focuses on co-benefits associated to achieving the 2°C target under different technological scenarios.