Cooling demand in integrated assessment models: a methodological review

The paper systematically reviews and compares 88 scenarios of energy demand in commercial and residential buildings that include the additional energy use or savings induced by thermal adaptation in heating and cooling needs at global level. The resulting studies are grouped in a novel classification that makes it possible to systematically understand why the energy projections of integrated assessment models vary depending on how changes in climatic conditions and the associated adaptation needs are modeled. Projections underestimate the energy demand of the building sector when it is driven only by income, population, unchanging climatic conditions and their associated adaptation needs. Across the studies reviewed, already by 2050 climate change will induce a median 30% (90%) percentage variation of a building's energy demand for cooling and a median -8% (-24%) percentage variation for heating, leading to a 2% (13%) increase when cooling and heating are combined, under the Representative Concentration Pathway 1.9 (8.5). The results underscore that models lacking extensive margin adjustments, and models that focus on residential demand, highly underestimate the additional cooling needs of the building sector. Topics that deserve further investigation regard improving the characterization of adopting energy-using goods that provide thermal adaptation services and better articulating the heterogeneous needs across sectors

Global vulnerability of crop yields to climate change

Using a newly-available panel dataset of gridded annual crop yields in conjunction with a dynamic econometric model that distinguishes between farmers' short-run and long-run responses to weather shocks and accounts for adaptation, we investigate the risk to global crop yields from climate warming. Over broad spatial domains we observe only slight moderation of short-run impacts by farmers' long-run adjustments. In the absence of additional margins of adaptation beyond those pursued historically, projections constructed using an ensemble of 21 climate model simulations suggest that the climate change could reduce global crop yields by 3–12% by mid-century and 11–25% by century's end, under a vigorous warming scenario

Power systems' performance under high renewables' penetration rates: a natural experiment due to the COVID-19 demand shock

COVID-19 lockdowns make it possible to investigate the extent to which an unprecedented increase in renewables' penetration may have brought unexpected limitations and vulnerabilities of current power systems to the surface. We empirically investigate how power systems in five European countries have dealt with this unexpected shock, drastically changing electricity load, the scheduling of dispatchable generation technologies, electricity day-ahead wholesale prices, and balancing costs. We find that low-cost dispatchable generation from hydro and nuclear sources has fulfilled most of the net-load even during peak hours, replacing more costly fossil-based generation. In Germany, the UK, and Spain coal power plants stood idle, while gas-fired generation has responded in heterogeneous ways across power systems. Falling operational costs of generators producing at the margin and lower demand, both induced by COVID-19 lockdowns, have significantly decreased wholesale prices. Balancing and other ancillary services' markets have provided the flexibility required to respond to the exceptional market conditions faced by the grid. Balancing costs for flexibility services have increased heterogeneously across countries, while ancillary markets' costs, measured only in the case of Italy, have increased substantially. Results provide valuable evidence on current systems' dynamics during high renewables' shares and increased demand volatility. New insights into the market changes countries will be facing in the transition towards a clean, secure, and affordable power system are offered

Intensive and extensive margins of the peak load: Measuring adaptation with mixed frequency panel data

In this work we investigate the response of daily electricity peak load to daily maximum temperatures across states in Europe and India. We propose a method that decomposes short- from medium/long-run effects, retains the high frequency nature of the load-weather covariation and treats economic growth as a modulating factor. By simultaneously exploiting variation in unexpected daily weather anomalies and decade-long climatic changes in each location we decompose transitory - intensive margin - adjustments from permanent - extensive margin - adjustments. We find that the shocks over the long-run differ substantially from the short-run dynamics. Furthermore, we find evidence that per capita income modulates the adjustments over the short- and long-run. We project that in response to climate change around 2050 the peak load may increase by up to 20%-30% in Southern Europe and in several states in India, depending on the degree of warming and the evolution of socio-economic conditions. Even with a limited scope to two world regions, we identify that the structure of the economy and differences in future income growth matter in shaping the adaptation to climate change. Our decomposition allows to identify how future weather anomalies can further amplify the relative increase associated to the shift in the climate norm. Assuming that the interannual variability of maximum temperatures follows the distribution observed in the past, we find a doubling of the impacts of climate change during the summer in Europe. Uncertainty around the distribution of future weather anomalies may lead to further unexpected peak load amplifications. Our results have important policy implications for power systems’ generation capacity, transmission and storage, as we show that the challenges to accommodate the peak load in days with extreme temperatures may substantially increase already around mid-century

Air-conditioning adoption and electricity demand highlight climate change mitigation–adaptation tradeoffs

We elucidate mid-century climate change impacts on electricity demand accounting for endogenous adoption of residential air-conditioning (AC) in affluent, cooler countries in Europe, and in poorer, hotter states in India. By 2050, in a high-warming scenario (SSP585) AC prevalence grows twofold in Europe and fourfold in India, reaching around 40% in both regions. We document a mitigation adaptation tradeoff: AC expansion reduces daily heat exposures by 150 million and 3.8 billion person degree-days (PDDs), but increases annual electricity demand by 34 TWh and 168 TWh in Europe and India, respectively (corresponding to 2% and 15% of today's consumption). The increase in adoption and use of AC would result in an additional 130 MMTCO2, of which 120 MMTCO2 in India alone, if the additional electricity generated were produced with today's power mix. The tradeoff varies geographically and across income groups: a one PDD reduction in heat exposure in Europe versus India necessitates five times more electricity (0.53 kWh vs 0.1 kWh) and two times more emissions (0.16 kgCO(2) vs 0.09 kgCO(2)), on average. The decomposition of demand drivers offers important insights on how such tradeoff can be moderated through policies promoting technology-based and behavioral based adaptation strategies

The Impact of Climate on Economic and Financial Cycles: A Markov-switching Panel Approach

This paper examines the impact of climate shocks on 13 European economies analysing jointly business and financial cycles, in different phases and disentangling the effects for different sector channels. A Bayesian Panel Markov-switching framework is proposed to jointly estimate the impact of extreme weather events on the economies as well as the interaction between business and financial cycles. Results from the empirical analysis suggest that extreme weather events impact asymmetrically across the different phases of the economy and heterogeneously across the EU countries. Moreover, we highlight how the manufacturing output, a component of the industrial production index, constitutes the main channel through which climate shocks impact the EU economies

Alleviating inequality in climate policy costs: An integrated perspective on mitigation, damage and adaptation

Equity considerations play an important role in international climate negotiations. While policy analysis has often focused on equity as it relates to mitigation costs, there are large regional differences in adaptation costs and the level of residual damage. This paper illustrates the relevance of including adaptation and residual damage in equity considerations by determining how the allocation of emission allowances would change to counteract regional differences in total climate costs, defined as the costs of mitigation, adaptation, and residual damage. We compare emission levels resulting from a global carbon tax with two allocations of emission allowances under a global cap-and-trade system: one equating mitigation costs and one equating total climate costs as share of GDP. To account for uncertainties in both mitigation and adaptation, we use a model-comparison approach employing two alternative modeling frameworks with different damage, adaptation cost, and mitigation cost estimates, and look at two different climate goals. Despite the identified model uncertainties, we derive unambiguous results on the change in emission allowance allocation that could lessen the unequal distribution of adaptation costs and residual damages through the financial transfers associated with emission trading

Predictors of morbidity and mortality in patients submitted to cytoreductive surgery plus hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy for ovarian carcinomatosis: A multicenter study

The aim of this retrospective study is to assess the incidence of morbidity and mortality related to cytoreductive surgery (CRS) plus hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC) and to evaluate their predictors, in patients with peritoneal metastasis of ovarian origin. A retrospective multicenter study was carried out investigating results from eight Italian institutions. A total of 276 patients met inclusion criteria. Predictors of morbidity and mortality were evaluated with univariate and multivariate analysis. Overall morbidity was 71.4%, and severe complications occurred in 23.9% of the sample; 60-day mortality was 4.3%. According to univariate logistic regression models, grade 3-4 morbidity was related to Peritoneal Cancer Index (PCI) (OR 1.06; 95% CI 1.02-1.09; p<0.001), number of intraoperative blood transfusions (OR 1.21; 95% CI 1.10-1.34; p<0.001), Completeness of Cytoreduction (CC) score (OR 1.68; 95% CI 1.16-2.44; p=0.006) and number of anastomoses (OR 1.32; 95% CI 1.00-1.73; p=0.046). However, at the multivariate logistic regression analysis, only the number of intraoperative blood transfusions (OR 1.17; 95% CI 1.5-1.30; p=0.004) and PCI (OR 1.04; 95% CI 1.01-1.08; p=0.010) resulted as key predictors of severe morbidity. Furthermore, using multivariate logistic regression model, ECOG score (OR 2.45; 95% CI 1.21-4.93; p=0.012) and the number of severe complications (OR 2.16; 95% CI 1.03-4.52; p=0.042) were recorded as predictors of exitus within 60 days. The combination of CRS and HIPEC for treating peritoneal metastasis of ovarian origin has acceptable morbidity and mortality and, therefore, it can be considered as an option in selected patients

Population Aging and Heat Exposure in the 21st Century: Which World Regions Are at Greatest Risk?

The co-occurring trends of rising temperatures and population aging threaten to create “hotspots” of rapidly growing concentrations of older adults and increasing high-temperature extremes in several world regions (1,2). These combined stressors will place intense demands on local governments, healthcare systems, and service providers to develop infrastructures and response systems that meet older adults’ distinctive needs. However, hotspots in lower-income nations across the Global South may lack the resources and institutional capacity to respond effectively (3), while hotspots in historically Republican-leaning U.S. states like Texas and Oklahoma currently lack climate action plans that could protect large and growing populations of older adults (4,5). In this editorial, we describe the outsized impacts of extreme heat on older adults’ well-being, document how the geographic patterning of population aging and rising temperatures places particular regions at risk, and urge tailored preventative efforts and adaptations to protect older adults