IPCC Assessment in depth, Part 12: What are the risks of ‘maladaptation’ and the unintended consequences of tackling climate change?

The threat that climate change poses to human well-being and the health of the planet is “unequivocal”, says the latest report from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). In this in-depth Q&A series, Carbon Brief unpacks the key findings of the report and the developments since the IPCC’s last assessment. (Read previous section here)

By Carbon Brief

12. What are the risks of ‘maladaptation’ and the unintended consequences of mitigation?

The report also explores “maladaptation”, which it describes as adaptation measures that “lead to an increase in the climate vulnerability of a system, sector or group”, either now or in the future.

“Maladaptation differs from ‘failed’ or ‘unsuccessful’ adaptation, which ‘describes a failed adaptation initiative not producing any significant detrimental effect’,” the report says.

The report says there are no “good” and “bad” adaptation choices and that the difference between adaptation and maladaptation should be viewed as a “continuum” shaped by local context.

Metrics that should be considered when assessing the success of adaptation projects include benefits to people and wildlife, potential to reduce emissions and “equity outcomes” for marginalised ethnic groups, women and low-income populations.

The report offers some examples of maladaptation. It cites a study examining the consequences of a large-scale irrigation project in Navarre, Spain, promoted by the Spanish government in response to changing climate conditions. The report says:

“Many small-scale producers could not afford the irrigation investment and had to sell or rent their land to those who joined the irrigation project. The project increased inequity, land concentration and lowered crop diversity, with small-scale producers more vulnerable to climate change.”

The report also cites colonial and post-colonial agricultural policies in India as an example of maladaptation.

“Although such policies increased national food production, they failed to address high levels of malnutrition, worsening regional inequalities, degraded natural resources and an agrarian debt crisis,” the report says.

As well as examining the potential for maladaptation, the report also explores “maladaptive mitigation”, the unintended consequences of measures to tackle greenhouse gas emissions.

It gives examples of how measures to tackle climate change may pose a risk to people or biodiversity. For example, the expansion of renewable energies such as solar and wind could impose on areas of biodiversity.

(Relatedly, a new study – covered in a Carbon Brief guest post earlier this month – says that conflicts between renewables and biodiversity protection do occur, but overlap need not be severe if renewables are deployed with appropriate policy and regulatory controls.)

The report says “the most serious emerging conflicts are between land-based approaches to mitigation and the protection of biodiversity”.

It lists two land-based approaches that could pose a serious risk: tree-planting and a technique for removing emissions from the atmosphere known as bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS).

Put simply, BECCS involves growing crops, burning them in a power plant to generate energy and then capturing the resulting CO2 before it is released into the air. The captured CO2 is then sent to an underground or undersea storage site.

Most scenarios envisaging how the world could limit warming 1.5C incorporate BECCS to some degree.

However, deploying BECCS on a worldwide scale would require vast areas of land to be converted to bioenergy plantations. This could raise large threats for the world’s biodiversity, which has already been significantly impacted by land-use change.

One study cited by the IPCC found that rolling out BECCS on a scale large enough to keep temperatures at 2C could pose such a large risk to land species that any benefit from reducing warming would be cancelled out.

A second study found that using BECCS to keep temperatures at 2C would have a greater impact on European bird species than a global temperature increase of 4C.

“To avoid the worst impacts of BECCS, it will need to be carefully targeted, according to context and local conditions and other mitigation strategies prioritised so its use can be minimised,” the report says.

On tree-planting, the report notes that replenishing formerly forested areas “can bring multiple benefits”, but planting trees in places where they do not grow naturally “can have serious environmental impacts, including potentially exacerbating the effects of climate change”.

Savannahs – grassy plains found in the tropics – are among ecosystems “that are at risk from afforestation [tree-planting] programmes”, the report says.

1. All sections:

   1. What is the IPCC report?
   2. How is climate change affecting land ecosystems?
   3. What impact is global warming having on marine life?
   4. How is climate change affecting the world’s water?
   5. What does the IPCC report say about impacts on food and agriculture?
   6. What risks does climate change pose to the world’s cities?
   7. What does the report say about public health, conflict and migration?
   8. How does climate change affect poverty and progress towards the sustainable development goals?
   9. How is the world adapting to climate change?
   10. Are there limits to what adaptation can achieve?
   11. What does the report say about ‘loss and damage’?
   12. What are the risks of ‘maladaptation’ and the unintended consequences of tackling climate change?
   13. What role can nature-based solutions play in adaptation and mitigation?
   14. What does the report say about climate-resilient development?
   15. What the latest IPCC report says about carbon fee and dividend

1. What is the IPCC report?
2. How is climate change affecting land ecosystems?
3. What impact is global warming having on marine life?
4. How is climate change affecting the world’s water?
5. What does the report say about impacts on food and agriculture?
6. What risks does climate change pose to the world’s cities?
7. What does the report say about public health, conflict and migration?
8. How does climate change affect poverty and progress towards the sustainable development goals?
9. How is the world adapting to climate change?
10. Are there limits to what adaptation can achieve?
11. What does the report say about ‘loss and damage’?
12. What are the risks of ‘maladaptation’ and the unintended consequences of tackling climate change?
13. What role can nature-based solutions play in adaptation and mitigation?
14. What does the report say about climate-resilient development?
15. What information about specific regions does the report contain?

Authors:

Aruna Chandrasekhar holds an MSc in environmental change and management from the University of Oxford. She previously worked as a freelance journalist for a variety of publications, including the New York Times, Guardian, Scroll and Caravan.

Daisy Dunne holds a BSc in biology from the University of Bristol and a science journalism MA from City, University of London. She was The Independent’s climate correspondent from November 2020 to 2021. Prior to this, she was Carbon Brief’s science writer from 2017 to 2020.

Josh Gabbatiss covers climate and energy policy. Josh holds a BSc in zoology from the University of Bristol. He previously worked as science correspondent at The Independent and prior to that was a freelance journalist for a variety of scientific publications including New Scientist and BBC Earth.