Climate change mitigation refers to practices designed to prevent, limit, reduce or postpone environmental changes caused by greenhouse gas emissions and related activities; such as activities which increase natural carbon sinks.
Stopping climate change requires plugging the leaks, which means limiting our use of fossil fuels and investing in renewables; protecting forests that act as carbon sinks and greening our cities as part of this plan.
Reduce how much people consume
At its core, climate change mitigation involves taking actions to lower human emissions of greenhouse gases while strengthening carbon sinks such as forests that remove them from the atmosphere – collectively known as “mitigation.” This process is known as “mitigation.”
These efforts involve creating and deploying new technologies, renewable energy sources, making old equipment more energy-efficient, changing consumption behavior to consume less, as well as natural solutions like restoring wetlands to mitigate flooding or planting crops that can endure warmer seasons and droughts.
Mitigation is a global effort requiring governments to set targets and devise policies in order to reach them. Such policies may include financial incentives, price measures or restrictions on fossil fuel use or emissions sources – or they could encompass an array of initiatives including:
Keep fossil fuels in the ground
Fossil fuel production must be reduced and ultimately phased out to prevent catastrophic climate change, but this will only occur through policies, incentives schemes and investment programs that encourage cleaner activities while discouraging those that produce greenhouse gases at an increasing rate.
This could involve taking steps such as tax and carbon pricing reforms, energy efficiency initiatives and subsidies, negative emissions technologies such as sulphur aerosols or carbon capture and storage technologies – among many others – as well as subsidies and clean energy subsidies.
Recent research demonstrates that in order to keep global warming under 1.5degC, nearly 60% of oil and gas reserves and 90% of coal must remain unused (Bartlett et al. 2015). Supply-side mitigation works by restricting extraction through reverse auctions that reward rights holders who forgo extracting.
Invest in renewable energy
Renewable energy investments offer an ethical and viable means of contributing to climate change mitigation. There are multiple approaches available, from investing in companies producing or managing clean energy production or management to purchasing shares of publicly traded partnerships such as MLPs that may offer tax advantages and high yield distributions.
Developing economies may benefit significantly by switching their growth strategies towards renewables, which helps lower emissions, enhance energy security and create employment opportunities.
These steps help mitigate human activity’s effect on the environment and build resilience for future generations, but will require significant investments, so everyone must do their part.
Switch to sustainable transport
Provide people with affordable and accessible public transport options — like battery electric buses and trains powered by renewable electricity — is one of the most cost-effective strategies for mitigating emissions. By decreasing carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere, this approach could help keep global warming below 2degC or below.
Reducing fossil fuel subsidies and structural barriers to sustainable transport remain major obstacles, such as high upfront costs for low-emission vehicles and charging infrastructure, resistance to change from local communities, as well as business interests that seek to preserve status quo status quo.
Companies are striving to achieve sustainability in their logistics operations through route optimization and other means. BMW, for instance, has set ambitious logistics goals for their business and logistics services, while Lenovo is working with Kuehne+Nagel on sustainable aviation fuels.
Green our cities
To combat climate change, we must lower emissions from buildings, industry and transport. To do so effectively, this can be achieved through investments in new technologies or renewable energy; changing behavior; or making existing technology more energy-efficient.
Protecting forests and restoring natural carbon “sinks”, like oceans, wetlands, grasslands and soil can also help to mitigate climate change while providing multiple co-benefits such as improved water and food security as well as biodiversity preservation.
Other measures involve making cities use less energy by improving building efficiency, lowering emissions from electricity and transport systems and creating greener urban planning. Regenerative farming practices can help lower methane and nitrous oxide, both potent greenhouse gas sources. Preserving open space along rivers and flood plains helps limit flooding damage as well as drought or wildfire damage.