Economic Evaluation of Climate Change Impacts on Ground Transportation in Atlantic Canada: General Equilibrium Framework

Climate change has become one of the most serious consequences of human activities. According to the IPCC Fourth assessment report, the emission of greenhouse gases (GHG) generated by human activities is the primary cause of the climate change and especially global warming. In general, transportation is one of the areas where climate change problem is the most severe. On the one hand, with passage of time vehicle usage will result in more greenhouse gases, which would contribute to further climate change; on the other hand, climate change itself makes transportation infrastructure, vehicles and operations vulnerable to various impacts. Unfortunately, very little has been done in order to estimate economic losses due to climate change impacts on transportation. THis study tries to capture this gap.In this study, climate change impacts and their economic consequences for Atlantic Canada ground transportation network are analyzed. First, major climate change impacts in the area are identified. Second, the best economic model to evaluate consequences of the climate change impacts is chosen. Third, using the existing literature and studies that describe future climate changes in the region, various scenarios of future challenges for the regional ground transportation network are specified. Finally, economic consequences of the regional climate change impacts on the ground transportation network are evaluated. The above specified consequences are imposed on a dynamic general equilibrium model and their cumulative impacts are traced over time.Climate change impacts could reduce the volume of transpiration associated with analyzed regional network by 0.07 to 0.14 million vehicles per year compared to the current volume of 4.89 million. It could lead to the loss in value added by 11.136 million per year.