Envisioning future climate resilience adaptation and mitigation strategies

Keywords: urban resilience, climate adaptation, mitigation, synergies, tradeoffs, futures, visioning, New York City
Session Type: Virtual Paper Abstract
Day: Tuesday
Session Start / End Time: 3/1/2022 09:40 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada)) - 3/1/2022 11:00 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 10

Abstract

Cities have increasingly incorporated climate change adaptation measures into their planning. Simultaneously, the intertwined objective of greenhouse gas mitigation has the potential to result in unintended consequences or complement adaptation goals. Therefore, there is a need to understand synergies and tradeoffs to ensure that both the goals of responding to current climate threats (adaptation) and limiting future climate threats (mitigation) are being met. Drawing on existing frameworks for comparing adaptation and mitigation strategies, we first analyzed strategies extracted from New York City (NYC) governance documents in a content analysis. Second, we analyzed strategies co-produced in a climate adaptation visioning workshop series held with New York government practitioners in Fall 2020. We find, for example, that the city’s comprehensive plan, OneNYC 2050, proposes adaptation strategies such as planting street trees, which help to slow and absorb stormwater during flooding and provide cooling, while also mitigating emissions via carbon sequestration. However, there are externalities including additional water and maintenance requirements that may undermine the intended objectives. During the workshops, participants built on this idea of adaptation and mitigation co-benefits by considering new strategies such as natural carbon sequestration through the integration of green spaces, water, and algae into architecture. We also find that despite short-term tradeoffs, long-term, visionary adaptation goals require mitigation strategies, and that there is room to make more explicit connections to mitigation strategies within adaptation planning. By understanding how city agencies frame adaptation and mitigation, we can help move cities towards a more comprehensive planning approach to climate resiliency.