Shanghai, China

The World Bank has recently published the report, Climate-Smart Development: Adding Up the Benefits of Actions that Help Build Prosperity, End Poverty and Combat Climate Change, to investigate the multiple benefits of mitigation policy and projects in five large countries, including Brazil, China, India, Mexico, and the United States. The purpose of the report is to examine how smart development policies and projects can improve communities, save lives, increase GDP, and at the same time slow the pace of adverse climate changes.

The report introduces a new assessment framework to estimate and quantify the economic, health, and other social benefits of policies and projects that reduce GHG emission. This assessment framework is applied on three policy case studies, including 1) Shift to Clean Transport, 2) Energy-efficiency Industry, and 3) Energy-efficiency Buildings, and four development project case studies, including 1) Sustainable Transport in India, 2) Integrated Solid Waste Management in Brazil, and 3) Cleaner Cookstoves in Rural China; and 4) Biogas Digesters and Photovoltaic Systems in Mexican Agriculture.

In terms of sustainable transport, the report estimates that, based on a series of policy achievement assumptions on fuel efficiency, model shift to public transit, efficient vehicles and freight, these changes will save approximately $170 per ton of avoided CO₂ emissions, increase GDP would by 0.5-0.8% comparing to the baseline levels in 2030, and policy measures taken in Brazil, China, India, Mexico, the US and the EU region would save more than 21,000 lives globally each year from premature deaths.

The report also estimates that the construction of a proliferated BRT system in India would lead to a Net Present Value (NPV) of $9.7 billion, reduce black carbon by 5,000-6,000 tons, save more than 27,200 lives, and increase India’s GDP by $11.5-$13.5 billion between 2013 and 2032.

You can download the full report here.