Climate-smart development: adding up the benefits of actions that help build prosperity, end poverty and combat climate change
Government policies that improve energy efficiency, waste management and public transport could increase global economic output by more than $1.8 trillion per year says this new report released by World Bank & ClimateWorks Foundation in advance of the U.N. Secretary General's Climate Summit in September 2014.
This report describes efforts by the ClimateWorks Foundation and the World Bank to quantify the multiple economic, social, and environmental benefits associated with policies and projects to reduce emissions in select sectors and regions.
The report has three objectives: to develop a holistic, adaptable framework to capture and measure the multiple benefits of reducing emissions of several pollutants; to demonstrate how local and national policymakers, members of the international development community, and others can use this framework to design and analyze policies and projects; and to contribute a compelling rationale for effectively combining climate action with sustainable development and green growth worldwide. By using a systems approach to analyze policies and projects, this work illustrates ways to capitalize on synergies between efforts to reduce emissions and spur development, minimize costs, and maximize societal benefits.
This report uses several case studies to demonstrate how to apply the analytical framework. Three simulated case studies analyzed the effects of key sector policies to determine the benefits realized in the United States, China, the European Union, India, Mexico, and Brazil.
The sector policies include regulations, taxes, and incentives to stimulate a shift to clean transport, improved industrial energy efficiency, and more energy efficient buildings and appliances. Also presented are results of four simulated case studies that analyzed several sub-national development projects, scaled up to the national level, to determine the additional benefits over the life of each project, generally 20 years.