Commenter

Karl Pepple, City of Houston

Thank you for the opportunity to comment.  There is a lot of good material in here. It is clear that a lot of work went into this.

The document mentions in several places that there are low and high emission scenarios, but it never addresses how to achieve one over another. The report recognizes that the low emission scenario is preferable to the high emission scenario. Toward this end, I recommend that the report discuss ways to mitigate climate change, not just adapt to climate change. To look at adaptation only is to treat the symptom, not the cause of the problem.  To make best use of taxpayer money, these Gulf Coast entities will need to look at adaptation and mitigation simultaneously. At a minimum, the report could briefly comment that mitigation also needs to be addressed, and provide links to resources on that topic.  If we do not mitigate, we will be adapting to ever-worsening conditions.  The transportation sector is responsible for a substantial fraction of the GHG emissions, so this seems like an opportunity to discuss potential mitigation efforts.

As far as developing a better idea of risk, the report Sir Nicholas Stern put together (The Economics of Climate Change) does a good job of attaching dollar figures to the risks involved - perhaps that could be used as a model for something similar in a future report.

Thank you for this opportunity to comment.

Response:

The authors recognize the importance of researching ways to reduce greenhouse gases, but that is beyond the scope of this effort.  Since the literature on GHG mitigation is large and multi-faceted, expansion of this effort into that area would take significant additional time and resources and is not possible at this time.  Nonetheless, DOT, through its Center on Climate Change and Environmental Forecasting, has undertaken numerous research activities to better understand the relationship between transportation and greenhouse gases and find effective ways to reduce these emissions.  These activities are expected to continue into the future.  You can find discussion of them at www.climate.dot.gov.

We appreciate the reference to Sir Stern’s paper.  We agree it has useful information.