Adapting to climate change the right way

Benjamin K. Sovacool, an associate professor at Vermont Law School, states in the Huffington Post that adaptation can produce benefits beyond resilience to climate change, such as economic stability, improved environmental quality, community investment, and local employment. The Asian Development Bank has estimated, for instance, that every $1 invested in adaptation now could yield as much as $40 in economic benefits by 2030.

Sovacool asserts that decisions made today on adaptation may determine how vulnerable we are to future climate-induced events. He uses the example of the Tropical Storm Irene as a powerful lesson that today's weather-related disaster can become tomorrow's humanitarian crisis.