New Report: Climate Change Impacts Threatens U.S. with "Prohibitive Costs"

The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) today (10 September 2009) released a brief report assessing the economic costs of climate change in the U.S., concluding that "every region in the country will confront large costs from climate change in the form of damages to infrastructure, diminished public heath, and threats to vital industries employing millions of Americans." 

 
In the 14 page report, Climate Change in the United States: The Prohibitive Costs of Inaction [PDF], UCS  summarizes the findings of many recent studies on the impacts of climate change, and the costs of those impacts.   In the UCS press release, Failing to Curb Global Warming Could Cost the Nation Hundreds of Billions by the End of the Century, New Report Finds,  Rachel Cleetus, climate economist at UCS, contrasts the costs of measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions with the costly impacts of climate change. "The investments we need to make in a clean energy economy are clearly affordable and will pay major dividends," she says.  "What we can't afford are the steep and rising costs of doing nothing."