CIEL - Climate Impact Equity Lens | Climate Change Gets Personal

Who are the people in CIEL?

Each individual's climate damages and emissions reduction costs are compared on the CIEL graph, which can show several people in a single year, or one person in multiple years. The people shown can be fictional – often based on plausible characteristics of real people – or real.

Posted on the CIEL website you'll find graphs and profiles for real people around the world, such as Yuyi Baba, 36, who raises cattle on Iki Island in Japan.

In CIEL, annual damages are smoothed out over a decade, so they never reach the level of any one terrible event that can take away most or all of one's income in single year. Any damage that results in more than a few percentage points loss to a person's income has a noticeable effect on her quality of life. A 20-percent loss would represent a really big challenge, and, unless you have a lot of savings or other assets, a 50-percent loss would be devastating.

Different people in one year

This example graph compares costs to savings for Persons A, B, and C in the year 2100. All markers above and to the left of the red line represent people who, in a particular year, see net losses from climate change, while all markers below and to the right of the red "break-even" line represent people with net gains.

•  Person A loses 37 percent of her income to climate damages in 2100 but saves 20 percent of her income by not having to pay for emissions cuts. Her net losses equal 17 percent of her income. (If Person A made $10,000 in 2100, she would lose about $3,700 but save $2,000. Her net losses would be $1,700.)
•  Person B loses 46 percent of her income to damages but saves 35 percent in avoided costs. Her net losses are 11 percent of her income.
•  Person C loses 9 percent of his income to damages but saves 21 percent in avoided costs. His net gains are 12 percent of his income.

Persons A, B, and C will experience climate change very differently. For A and B, damages outweigh savings in 2100, but for C, savings outweigh damages.

Different years for one person

CIEL can also be used to track climate damages and savings from not reducing emissions for a single person (or, more believably, people with similar characteristics) over several decades. This graph shows losses and gains for Person B in 2050, 2100, and 2150.

•  In 2050, Person B loses 16 percent of her income to climate damages but saves 17 percent in avoided costs. Her net gains are 1 percent of her income. (If Person B made $10,000 in 2050, she would lose $1,600 but save $1,700. Her net gains would be $100.)
•  In 2100, she loses 46 percent of her income to climate damages but saves 35 percent in avoided costs. Her net losses are 11 percent of her income.
•  In 2150, she loses 73 percent of her income to climate damages but saves 37 percent in avoided costs. Her net losses are 36 percent of her income.

Person B starts out with net gains – more savings than damages – but by 2100 is suffering net losses – more damages than savings – from climate change.

Who are the people?

Each person shown on the CIEL graph is assigned a set of defining characteristics. Income per capita, economic vulnerability, sea-level rise vulnerability, and water shortage vulnerability determine what share of global damages from climate change each person will suffer. Income per capita and region determine what share of emission reduction costs each person will be spared from paying.

•  Income per capita – household income divided by the number of people in the household.
•  Economic vulnerability – share of household income from industries that are especially vulnerable to climate change, such as agriculture, fishing and tourism.
•  Sea-level rise vulnerability – exposure of home to sea-level rise and storm surges.
•  Water shortage vulnerability – local fresh water availability: areas where less than 1,000 cubic meters are available per person per year are "water scarce"; areas with between 1,000 and 1,700 cubic meters are "water stressed"; and areas with more than 1,700 cubic meters are "water abundant."
•  Region – one of nine world regions.

Nine world regions

Different areas of the world have different patterns of energy use and different emissions. In CIEL, emission reduction costs are based on detailed technical information about each region and each individual's income.The poorer you are the larger your emissions costs are likely to be as a share of your income. The nine regions used in CIEL are:

•  Africa (AF) includes Sub-Saharan and North Africa;
•  China (CH) includes Hong Kong but not Taiwan or Macau;
•  Eastern Europe (EE) includes Russia and non-EU Eastern Europe, i.e., European ex-USSR, ex-Yugoslavia, and Albania;
•  Europe (EU) includes EU-27, Norway, Switzerland, Iceland, and Turkey;
•  Latin America and the Caribbean (LA) includes Puerto Rico and all Virgin Islands;
•  Middle East (ME) excludes North Africa;
•  Other High Income (OH) includes Canada, Japan, South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand;
•  Developing Asia/Pacific (DA) includes South and Southeast Asia, Taiwan, Asian ex-USSR and Pacific;
•  United States (US) excludes Puerto Rico and smaller island territories such as Guam and American Samoa.

Sample people in CIEL

Each person shown on the CIEL graph is assigned a set of defining characteristics. Region, income per capita, economic vulnerability, coastal exposure, and fresh water availability to determine their climate damages and savings from not reducing emissions. In the graph shown here:

•  Person A lives in the Developing Asia/Pacific region. Her household of three adults and two children makes about US$7,500 each year, for an average income of $1,500 per person; 90 percent of this income comes from the tourism industry. Her home is in a village not far from the Indian Ocean, at about 4 meters above sea level. Fresh water is abundant.
•  Person B lives in Africa. Her household of one adult and three children makes about US$2,000 each year, for an average income of $500 per person; all of this income comes from agriculture. Her home is inland, many meters above sea level, in an area where fresh water is very scarce.

Sample people in CIEL

•  Person C lives in the United States. His household of two adults and one child makes about US$90,000 each year, for an average income of $30,000 per person, none of which is derived from an industry that is especially vulnerable to climate change. His home is inland, away from the ocean and river deltas, and well above sea level. Water is abundant in his local area.

In 2100, Person A experiences a net loss from climate change equal to 17 percent of her income, Person B experiences a 11 percent loss, but Person C experiences a net gain equal to 12 percent of his income. A, B, and C have very different incomes, and vulnerabilities to climate change. And they live in different regions with different patterns of energy use. As a result, their net impacts from climate change are not the same.

CIEL graphs for real people

CIEL can also be used to graph impacts over time for real people, like Yuyi Baba, the Japanese cattle rancher we introduced in the first slide.

Baba lives just about 100 meters from the coast, but his home is at least 20 meters above sea-level, so he's not concerned about direct impacts from sea-level rise or storms. And climate change has been benign so far, he says: December temperatures seem milder,and there is less frost in January and February. But he does worry about the cattle – warming could ruin the pasture, and that could hurt the animals' health and the quality of their beef.

In this graph, Baba's see small net benefits in 2050. By 2100, his losses from climate changes are significantly larger than his savings from not reducing emissions. From 2100 to 2150, Baba's savings shrink very slightly while his damages more than double.