The Climate Adaptation Feedback

Many behavioral responses to climate change are carbon-intensive, raising concerns that adaptation may cause additional warming. The sign and magnitude of this feedback depend on how increased emissions from cooling balance against reduced emissions from heating across space and time. We present an empirical approach that forecasts the effect of future adaptive energy use on global average temperature over the 21st century. We find energy-based adaptation will lower global mean surface temperature in 2099 by 0.12 degrees Celsius (0.07 degrees Celsius) relative to baseline projections under RCP8.5 (RCP4.5) and avoid 1.8 (0.6) trillion USD ($2019) in damages. Energy-based adaptation lowers business-as-usual emissions for 85% of countries, reducing the mitigation required to meet their unilateral Nationally Determined Contributions under the UNFCCC by 20% on average. These findings indicate that while business-as-usual adaptive energy use is unlikely to accelerate warming, it raises important implications for countries’ existing mitigation commitments.