Crossing the Energy Divide: Moving from Fossil Fuel Dependence to a Clean-Energy Future

8. Preparing Cities for the Perfect Storm

We see two compelling reasons for taking present action to cope with distant, still hard-to-see threats. The first, which we have discussed throughout this book, is the need for mitigation—the near-term reductions of fossil-fuel combustion and carbon emissions needed to reduce the severity of future climate-change damages, as well as to find a more sustainable growth path and break free of imported–oil dependence. The second, which we focus on here, is the need for adaptation—preparation for changes that at this point we can no longer stop.

The consensus of climate science tells us that no matter how good we are at mitigation (and we’d better be very good at it), catastrophic extreme-weather events are ...