'Places in China, US most at risk for climate damage'
Major industrial and economic centres on the mainland and in the United States are among the most vulnerable regions in the world to the increasingly destructive power of climate change-driven weather extremes, according to a comprehensive analysis published on Monday. The new findings underscore the urgent need for governments to focus on decarbonisation and adaptation measures such as flood-proofing – and show the economic fallout from climate change could be grave and widespread. Nine of the top 10 most at-risk regions are in the mainland, with two of the country's largest sub-national economies – Jiangsu and Shandong – leading the global ranking by The Cross Dependency Initiative (XDI). After the mainland, the US has the most high-risk states. Florida, number 10 in global rankings, is the US state most in jeopardy, followed by California and Texas. China, India and the United States make up over half the states and provinces in the top 100. The initiative assessed more than 2,600 regions worldwide, using climate models together with weather and environmental data to assess the economic damage that temperature rises could wreak by 2050. The study is based on a 3-degree Celsius increase in temperatures by the end of the century, under a scenario drawn up by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.  The data showed that some of the engine rooms of the global economy face catastrophic hazards such as rising sea levels, river flooding and wildfires, which could also depress property prices and deter investment, XDI said.  "We're already feeling the significant impacts of weather events around the world, and they will only increase," XDI Chief Executive Rohan Hamden told reporters.  "Finally, we just want to make sure that every investment decision is made in a climate-resilient way." (AFP/Reuters)