Does black carbon abatement hamper CO₂ abatement? A letter

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Concerns have been raised that near-term black carbon abatement strategies for global warming mitigation would interfere with the longer-term CO₂ abatement efforts. In response, we put forward a “combined target and metric approach”, a theoretical framework, in which the time horizon of the metric is linked to the specific target of the climate policy. In this approach, a shorter time horizon for the metric is justified only when the overall climate policy is tightened; the lower the target level of the climate policy, the earlier the year of the target. Employing a consistent time perspective for the metric and target means that enhanced near-term reduction of short-lived climate forcers does not reduce the importance of the CO₂ abatement, since the overall climate target is stricter.

More details

• DOI: 10.1007/s10584-010-9941-3
• Year: 2010
• Journal: Climatic Change
• Language: English
• Volume: 103
• Issue: 3-4
• Page: 627 - 633
• Issn: 0165-0009
• Publisher: Kluwer Academic Publishers