Tipping elements and climate-economic shocks: Pathways toward integrated assessment

摘要

The literature on the costs of climate change often draws a link betweenclimatic 'tipping points' and large economic shocks, frequently called'catastrophes'. The use of the phrase 'tipping points' in this context can bemisleading. In popular and social scientific discourse, 'tipping points'involve abrupt state changes. For some climatic 'tipping points,' thecommitment to a state change may occur abruptly, but the change itself may berate-limited and take centuries or longer to realize. Additionally, theconnection between climatic 'tipping points' and economic losses is tenuous,though emerging empirical and process-model-based tools provide pathways forinvestigating it. We propose terminology to clarify the distinction between'tipping points' in the popular sense, the critical thresholds exhibited byclimatic and social 'tipping elements,' and 'economic shocks'. The last may beassociated with tipping elements, gradual climate change, or non-climatictriggers. We illustrate our proposed distinctions by surveying the literatureon climatic tipping elements, climatically sensitive social tipping elements,and climate-economic shocks, and we propose a research agenda to advance theintegrated assessment of all three.