Legal news and trends for Canadian in-house counsel and c-suite executives
Issue link: https://digital.canadianlawyermag.com/i/50160
By Patricia MacInnis adaptation W Warming to Experts urge in-house lawyers to understand the ramifications of new developments in environmental law With the current global economic outlook, climate change issues may be tak- ing a back seat to fiscal woes, but corporate counsel will want to stay on top of the issue given recent developments in the area of environmental adaptation. A recent report from the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy suggests the cost of climate change could top the $5-billion mark in Canada in less than eight years, and rise to between $21 billion and $42 billion by the 2050s. The NRTEE suggests the magnitude of the costs depends on a combina- tion of two factors: global emissions growth and Canada's economic and population growth. The report addresses what those costs could be and underscores the fact that while there is an environmental cost to climate change, there is also an economic cost: a cost of climate impacts occurring and a cost of adapting to protect against those impacts. Since climate change impacts manifest in different ways in different regions and sectors of Canada, NRTEE conducted specific "bottom-up" studies to assess the costs of climate change on three representative aspects of Canada: its prosperity (timber supply), places (coastal areas), and people (human health). "By the 2050s, the impacts of climate change on the timber supply through changes in pests, fires, and forest growth are expected to cost the Canadian economy between $2 billion and $17 billion a year," states the NRTEE report entitled, "Paying the Price: The Economic Impacts of Climate Change for Canada." The report also points out that the coastal land area exposed to climate- change induced flooding from rising sea levels and increased storm activity across the country is roughly equivalent to the size of the Greater Toronto Area. Climate change, it adds, will lead to warmer summers and poorer air 26 • DECEMBER 2011/JANUARY 2012 INHOUSE