1. First Quarter 2016Volume X, No. 1-3
2015 Awards Show Steady
Growth of Climate Change as
Market Driver
Paris and Pope Francis change the
conversation
F
or the first time since the 2009-
2010 period, when Copenhagen
signaled the demise of the Kyoto
Protocol and U.S. senators John Kerry, Joe
Lieberman and Lindsey Graham gave up
their bipartisan drive to pass climate poli-
cy, the political tides seem to have shifted
decisively toward action and investment
for greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation
and climate change adaptation.
Yes, Paris is a voluntary agreement, and
its ultimate influence will depend “on the
weight given to it by political forces and
markets,” as Kyle Danish of DC law firm
Van Ness Feldman wrote after COP21
(bit.ly/1SsJx42). And yes, Congressional
Republicans hostile to climate policy
will likely control Congress for the next
few years—at least. With a Republican
president, we could see the United States
backing away from its Paris commitments,
which are based mostly on executive ac-
tions.
But such a move would risk an intense
international backlash, including possible
carbon taxes on U.S. exports. It would
also open a floodgate of lawsuits by the
same U.S. states, local governments and
NGOs that won the Supreme Court’s
agreement in 2007 that GHGs are air
pollutants to be regulated under the Clean
Air Act. In fact, Danish posits that the
next U.S. president will face “almost im-
mediate international pressure to increase
the ambition” of GHG-cutting measures
such as tighter standards for power plants,
vehicles and methane leaks in the oil and
gas sector.
Internationally, Paris will mean more
work for companies and NGOs that can
assist developing nations in taking low-
emission development strategies (LEDS)
and adaptating to climate change. In the
private sector, the main participants will
be large firms like Tetra Tech, CH2M,
Arup, AECOM and ICF and their sub-
contractors, as well as some mid-sized
firms with foreign offices.
Cheryl Karpowicz of Ecology and En-
vironment, a mid-sized firm with about
300 staff in Latin America, told CCBJ
that she expects Paris to lead to “new
opportunities” for her firm “to support
reducing emissions and building resilience
to climate change impacts … in devel-
oping countries.” (See full Q&A in this
edition.) Clients for this kind of work are
the aid agencies like USAID and GIZ,
multilateral funders such as the World
Bank, major foundations like Rockefeller
and even NGOs like WWF and Save the
Children.
While a great deal must be done in
rural farming regions—CCBJ award
recipients Oxfam America/World Food
Program have an exemplary business
model that combines insurance and physi-
cal adaptation—the priorities for action
out of Paris are the fast-growing cities of
the developing world.
According to Ingrid Gabriela Hoven,
director general, global issues, for the
German aid agency BMZ, directing
climate finance toward cities represents a
major shift for BMZ and other aid agen-
cies. “The thinking [in the past] has been
that if you provide more assistance to
urban areas, you might pull more people
from rural areas, undermining goals such
as combating hunger,” Hoven said at a
COP21 side event. She noted that only
about 10% of climate finance to date has
gone to cities, but said the trend is toward
urban initiatives.
2015 Executive Review & CCBJ Awards
2015 CCBJ Awards 3
Up to 20 staff working on climate change for Swiss Consulting Firm Ernst
Basler + Partner 10
With strong policy and business drivers, Ecology & Environment sees growing
markets for GHG mitigation, adaptation 13
American Security Project: Climate change figures in Middle East conflicts; for
adaptation at home, civilian and military leaders must cooperate 17
ICF: Climate change consultancy examines growth drivers and challenges 18
AECOM:Adaptation in early phase of long-term growth cycle 21
Choice and flexibility keys to winning consumer interest in energy efficiency, says
Research into Action President Jane Peters 24
Stantec sees growth ahead in North American resilience, adaptation work 26
Planet Labs: Faster, higher-rez imagery, automated image analysis are
ingredients for successful REDD+ recipe 28
Better analytics and forecasting of weather and demand will enable growth of
distributed PV, says Green Power Labs CEO Alexandre Pavlovski 30
3. Climate Change Business Journal 31st Quarter 2016 MarketIntelligenceonClimateChange
2015 CCBJ Business
Achievement Awards
E
ach year Climate Change Busi-
ness Journal recognizes outstand-
ing business performance in the
climate change industry with our CCBJ
Business Achievement Awards. Climate
Change Business Journal is proud to
announce its 8th annual business achieve-
ment awards for achievements in 2015.
Congratulations to the winners, thanks to
all the companies that submitted nomi-
nations, and we hope to see you in San
Diego for the official awards ceremony at
Environmental Industry Summit XIV on
March 9, 2016 at the histroic Hotel del
Coronado in Cornado, California, near
San Diego.
In October-December 2015, CCBJ
solicited industry, government, non-profits
and the broader climate change commu-
nity via e-mail, social media, its website,
industry events and word-of-mouth for
nominations for the 2015 CCBJ Business
Achievement Awards. Nominations were
accepted in 200-word essays in either
specific or unspecified categories. Catego-
ries may have been adjusted depending on
the volume of nominations or the number
of worthy recipients. Final awards were
determined by a committee of CCBJ staff.
Growth: Climate Change Adaptation
and Resilience
ICF International for continuing the
rapid expansion of its climate impacts and
adaptation practice. In 2015, ICF secured
a five-year, $30 million contract with the
National Coordination Office of the U.S.
Global Change Research Program, the
federal agency program charged with
managing climate science and communi-
cating it to the public, as well as writing
periodic National Climate Assessments.
ICF will support USGCRP in four areas
related to climate and the environment:
science, informing decisions, assessment
and communications and education.
ICF also won new climate adaptation
and resilience business in 2015 from the
City of Philadelphia, Climate Central,
USAID and Millennium Challenge
Corporation. With the addition of 2015
projects, ICF has now worked for over
a dozen U.S. Government agencies on
climate issues.
Notable ICF climate projects com-
pleted in 2015 include: States at Risk,
America’s Preparedness Report Card, a
ranking of all 50 U.S. states on their readi-
ness for climate change (for Climate Cen-
tral); Toward a Climate-Ready Philadel-
phia, a report outlining how the city can
address its major climate challenges, heat
waves and flooding; a Vulnerability and
Risk Assessment for Southeast Pennsyl-
vania Transportation Authority’s regional
rail network; and a climate change and
extreme weather modeling toolkit for the
Airport Cooperative Research Program.
A management, technology and policy
consulting firm, ICF generated $1.05 bil-
lion in revenue in 2014, and $851 million
in revenue for the nine months ending
September 30, 2015.
Growth: GHG Mitigation Practice
SCS Engineers for achieving 50%
growth in GHG management and miti-
gation services in 2015. A long-standing
leader in consulting engineering for the
solid waste industry, SCS has developed
a growing business helping clients in that
sector comply with GHG regulations,
including federal EPA inventory and
reporting requirements and California’s
AB 32, under which solid waste opera-
tors are required to analyze—and in many
cases mitigate—the GHGs associated
with landfill expansions and other major
projects.
In addition to preparing GHG inven-
tories and analyses and mitigation plans
for the solid waste sector, SCS verifies
the emissions inventories of clients in
electric power, oil and gas, food process-
ing, ethanol production and other types
of manufacturers. SCS also verifies GHG
offset projects involving ozone depleting
substances, dairy manure methane, coal
mine methane, rice cultivation, organic
waste composting and (for project spon-
sors who aren’t SCS consulting clients)
landfill methane.
At the end of 2015, SCS Engineers’
revenue from these business lines was on
track to grow from $5.2 million in 2014
to $7.8 million in 2015, according to esti-
mates shared with CCBJ. SCS Engineers
generated total revenues of $155 million
in 2014.
Growth: Low-Carbon Energy
First Solar, the vertically integrated
manufacturer, developer, builder and
operator of solar PV power plants for its
growth in 2015 and its robust 3.7 GW
pipeline of projects in various stages of
development.The Tempe, AZ, based
company reported 2014 revenues of $3.4
billion and saw its revenues for Q2 2015
grow by 43% to $1.27 billion from 2014,
driven by sales of its interest in the under-
construction Desert Stateline project and
higher than expected revenue from three
other power plants.
While the growth story in solar PV
for several years has been distributed
generation, First Solar concentrates on
utility-scale power plants, which are lower
cost and easier to manage for grid opera-
tors. First Solar’s Vision 2020 strategic
plan focuses on international geographic
expansion into markets it believes have
a compelling need for “mass-scale PV
electricity,” including the Americas, Asia,
the Middle East, and Africa.
Driving down the levelized cost of
electricity (LCOE)—net present value of
total life cycle costs of a PV solar power
system divided by the energy it’s expected
to produce—from its PV plants is the
heart of First Solar’s competitive strategy.
In a June 2015 speech to the Edison Elec-
tric Institute, CEO Jim Hughes said the
firm regularly bids on utility power pur-
4. 4 Climate Change Business Journal 1st Quarter 2016Market Intelligence on Climate Change
chase agreements at 5 cents and 6 cents
per kWh. “We’re beginning to see 4- to
5-cent [solar] power [and] I fully believe
that within 10 years we’ll be talking about
low-3-cent power on a peak basis.”
One wild card in First Solar’s hand is
how the extension of the 30% investment
tax credit (ITC) for U.S. solar PV installa-
tions will affect its ability to compete with
distributed PV. Prior to the extensions
passed in December 2015, First Solar was
anticipating that its cost advantages would
be more prominent in a post-ITC world.
Now that the ITC is in place for many
more years, the firm’s cost advantage will
be less significant.
Financing: Climate Change
Adaptation and Resilience
Oxfam America and the World Food
Program for the R4 Rural Resilience
Initiative which is developing crop insur-
ance as a climate resilience and adaptation
measure for farmers in Ethiopia, Senegal,
Malawi and Zambia. In rural communi-
ties where insurance was an unknown
concept, these organizations and their
local partners have persuaded more than
30,000 farmers in Ethiopia and Senegal to
purchase—with a mix of cash and sweat
equity—crop insurance.
The parametric insurance policies pay
farmers for estimated losses when seasonal
rainfall totals fall below a certain thresh-
old. In R4’s Q2 2015 report, premiums of
$306,000 had been collected in Ethiopia
and Senegal on insured value of $1.5 mil-
lion. Payouts have totaled $36,000 so far.
R4 also promotes physical adaptation
measures, such as stone bunds (retaining
walls) and ponds to retain rainfall, as well
as disaster risk reduction training and
programs that encourages savings.
While adaptation is usually associated
with engineering solutions, insurance has
become increasingly viewed as an impor-
tant strategy to mitigate the damage from
extreme weather and climate change in
the developing world. In June 2015, the
G7 member nations agreed to provide
insurance against climate-related hazards
for 400 million vulnerable people.
One of the 17 members of the inter-
national Oxfam confederation, Oxfam
America works to right the wrongs of
poverty, hunger, and injustice in more
than 90 countries.The World Food Pro-
gram is the food assistance branch of the
UN.
Financing: GHG Mitigation
Renovate America for surpassing $1
billion in financing for residential energy
efficiency, water conservation and distrib-
uted solar PV improvements through its
four-year-old Home Energy Renovation
Opportunity (HERO) Program. HERO
is far and away the leading administrator
of residential Property Assessed Clean
Energy (PACE) programs in the nation,
having made home energy and water
upgrades affordable to more than 45,000
homeowners. HERO is made available
through a public-private partnership with
over 360 communities representing nearly
80% of California.
According to PACENow.org, a total
of $1.184 billion in home improvements
have been financed through PACE
programs nationwide, making HERO the
leader with almost 90% of national market
share. Over the useful lifetime of the
installed products and systems, the $1 bil-
lion in improvements and distributed PV
financed through HERO are projected
to save homeowners $2 billion on energy
bills, conserve 6.7 billion kWh of electric-
ity, reduce emissions by 1.8 million tons
and save more than 2.1 billion gallons of
water. According to Renovate America,
HERO also has created more than 8,400
jobs and generated aggregate economic
impact of more than $1.7 billion in the
state of California, with planned expan-
sion into other states in 2016.
Consulting & Engineering: Climate
Change Adaptation and Resilience
CH2M for completing research on
future rainfall intensity in the UK and the
implications for sewer and stormwater
system design. With damaging floods
wreaking havoc in late 2015, UK media
quoted climate scientists saying that De-
cember’s high temperatures and precipita-
tion levels fell outside the range of natural
variability and were partly due to climate
change.
According to CH2M’s client, UK
Water Industry Research, the report has
produced estimates of rainfall intensity
change using a combination of climate
analogue data and a high-resolution (1.5
km) climate model developed by the UK
Met Office. “The resultant rainfall intensi-
ty change estimates are, in general, higher
than existing UK guidance suggests.
Sewer flooding frequency and volume,
and frequency of pollution events are also
investigated for five locations; indicating
that these are also likely to increase in the
future.”
According to CH2M, the project
provided fresh insight into how urban
drainage systems should be adapted to
accommodate climate change with combi-
nations of increased capacity and the use
of stormwater green infrastructure to re-
duce demand and manage flow pathways
on the surface.
An employee-controlled profes-
sional engineering services firm, CH2M
(formerly CH2M Hill) produced $3.95
billion in revenues during the first three
quarters of 2015.
Dewberry for providing decision sup-
port on climate stressors to infrastructure
and assets for federal, state, local and
private clients in 2015. Building on its
history in hazard risk management and
engineering, Dewberry has taken on some
of the largest and most critical sea level
rise (SLR) projects, providing analysis and
5. Climate Change Business Journal 51st Quarter 2016 MarketIntelligenceonClimateChange
guidance for FEMA, the US Army Corps
of Engineers (USACE), EPA and Trans-
portation Research Board (TRB), as well
as vulnerable state and local governments
such as New York, Florida and the City of
Virginia Beach.
In 2015, Dewberry delivered SLR
floodplain mapping for lower New York
State to the New York State Energy
Research and Development Authority,
and was awarded follow-on work to sup-
port development of an Internet viewer.
Dewberry also received new awards from
NYSERDA for a community coastal ero-
sion study and a collaborative effort with
the New York State Department of Trans-
portation to research bridge and culvert
vulnerability.
Dewberry was awarded a contract by
the Florida Department of Economic
Opportunity to lead a pilot program for
sea level rise vulnerability assessments
and adaptation pilot studies. And in May
2015, it was named by the New Jersey
Department of Environmental Protec-
tion as one of the key consultants on the
Rebuild by Design Hudson River Project.
At the federal level, Dewberry’s
summary report for climate change risk
assessment and adaptation guidance for
airports was published by TRB’s Airport
Cooperative Research Program. Also
in 2015, Dewberry completed a climate
change analysis for the National Flood
Insurance Program’s Environmental Im-
pact Study, undertook a vulnerability anal-
ysis for EPA’s Oceans and Coastal Protec-
tion Division, and reviewed USACE tools
for detecting non-stationarity at river gage
stations across the country.
Headquartered in Fairfax, Va., Dew-
berry has approximately 2,000 employees
and generated $380 million in revenue in
2014.
Hazen and Sawyer for its leadership
role in evaluating climate change assess-
ment and adaptation planning for water
and wastewater utilities. In 2013, the firm
partnered with CH2M on the post-Sandy
NYC Wastewater Resiliency Plan, and
more recently it has performed studies on
water and climate change for the Ameri-
can Water Works Association, Water Re-
search Foundation, Water Environment
Research Foundation, Water Services As-
sociation of Australia and other industry
groups.
The firm has special expertise in evalu-
ating how climate change will affect water
quality and water demand. On the water
quality side, Hazen and Sawyer executives
published papers and spoke at industry
conferences in 2015 about how climate
change can increase risks of disinfection
by-products and harmful algal blooms. In-
dividual water utility clients appreciate the
firm’s work in modeling demand changes
over time, factoring climate change,
population growth and other factors into
the models that utilities use for their long
term asset and resource planning.
A water-focused engineering and tech-
nical services firm, Hazen and Sawyer had
2014 revenues at $165 million.
Kleinfelder for its resiliency work with
local governments and infrastructure
managers, primarily on the East Coast.
Kleinfelder’s large clients include Mass-
port, operator of airports and ports in
Massachusetts, and Washington D.C.’s
Department of Energy and Environment,
but the firm has also worked for many
smaller communities.
For Massport, Kleinfelder performed
a Disaster and Infrastructure Resiliency
Planning study commissioned after Irene,
Sandy and other storms flooded terminals,
caused other damage and “demonstrated
the link between climate hazards and the
resiliency of the built environment,” ac-
cording to MassPort. Drafted in 2014, the
DIRP was updated in 2015 to include the
best available coastal flood risk modeling
data. Kleinfelder also helped MassPort in
2015 to develop flood response plans for
Logan International Airport and guided
its evaluation of more than 20 flood
protection products before eventually
selecting AquaFence, which received a $1
million order (see Aquafence profile in
CCBJ’s Q4 2015 issue).
In June 2015, Kleinfelder’s first report
on Climate Projections and Scenario
Development for Washington, D.C. was
published (collaborators include Perkins
+ Will, Atmos Research and Consulting
and the universities of New Hampshire
and Massachusetts at Boston). Kleinfelder
has also helped towns and cities in Massa-
chusetts with climate risk assessment and
adaptation planning, often performing
pro bono work to help potential clients
obtain funding for studies from the state’s
Coastal Zone Management program.
A design firm with complimentary en-
gineering and environmental capabilities,
Kleinfelder has close to 2,000 employees
in the United States, Canada and Austra-
lia and 2014 revenues of $380 million.
Moffatt & Nichol for integrating
sea level rise and other climate change
impacts into the design and engineering
of some of the United States’ most vulner-
able communities and facilities. Some
of the firm’s recent projects include the
Shoreline Protection Feasibility Project
for San Francisco International Airport
(performed with another engineering
firm, AGS), a shoreline protection system
for the 400-acre Treasure Island Develop-
ment Project in San Francisco Bay and
protection measures for Santa Barbara’s
iconic Cabrillo Pavillion.
In August 2015, the firm and partners
West 8 and Louisiana State University
Coastal Sustainability Studio won a de-
sign competition run by EDF to develop a
100-year framework to sustain the Lower
Mississippi River Delta.The Giving Delta
framework was built on principles includ-
ing “empower[ing] the River to nourish
6. 6 Climate Change Business Journal 1st Quarter 2016Market Intelligence on Climate Change
the human, economic, and ecological sys-
tems that depend on the River as a shared
resource” and “build[ing] and sustain[ing]
wetlands to mitigate the effects of climate
change and subsidence and to slow the
inevitable marine transgression of the
Delta.” A global infrastructure advisor
specializing in coastal projects and freight,
Moffatt & Nichol employs more than
600 staff and had $134 million in 2014
revenue.
Business Model Innovation: Climate
Change Adaptation and Resilience
Entergy Corporation for its support
of pilot projects and methodologies to
make wetlands enhancement and restora-
tion a viable source of carbon offsets, thus
spurring private investment in wetlands
projects which have value for climate
change adaptation and resilience as well as
GHG mitigation.
Entergy supported the development
of the first wetland carbon methodology
that introduced wetland restoration to
emissions trading markets and the first
wetland carbon pilot project in the nation.
In 2015 a two-year assessment, supported
by Entergy’s Environmental Initiatives
Fund, and prepared in partnership by
Tierra Resources and The Climate Trust,
determined carbon finance revenue can
provide up to $1.6 billion in critical fund-
ing to assist with wetland restoration over
the next 50 years.
Study findings also showed that res-
toration in Louisiana has the potential to
produce over 1.8 million metric tons of
offsets per year; almost 92 million tonnes
over 50 years. Entergy’s commitment
to the study stems from the company’s
mission to create sustainable value for all
its stakeholders. Wetlands play a crucial
role in storm protection for many Entergy
communities, helping preserve industries,
businesses, homes, and livelihoods along
with Entergy’s own facilities and assets.
Operating electric utilities in Texas,
Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississipi and
a wholesale energy commodities business,
Entergy has annual revenues of more than
$12 billion and approximately 13,000
employees.
The Nature Conservancy for leverag-
ing its expertise, reputation, fundraising
abilities and political skills to catalzye
investment and action for climate change
resilience and adaptation. Over the last
decade,TNC has connected its core
mission—“protecting nature, preserving
life”—with climate change adaptation and
resilience by supporting and developing
green and hybrid gray-green infrastructure
solutions.
In the United States,TNC has part-
nered with CH2M, AECOM and En-
vironmental Science Associates around
green infrastructure and worked with
local governments and smaller consulting
firms on a wide range of climate resil-
ience projects.Through its outreach and
education to members and others,TNC is
raising awareness that natural systems and
natural infrastructure help protect people
and property.
TNC is building on its success with
innovative transaction-based financing
structures—such as fishing quota acqui-
sition, debt swaps and water funds—to
create new resources for conservation and
climate change adaptation through its
NatureVest unit. A landmark debt swap
project that closed in December 2015 will
benefit the Seychelles, a small island state
that faces severe climate change risks and
is burdened with a high level of distressed
sovereign debt.
The Nature Conservancy raised $23
million in impact capital loans and $5
million in grants to buy back $29.6 mil-
lion of Seychelles debt at a 5.4% discount.
The cash flow from the restructured debt
is payable to and managed by the new
Seychelles Conservation and Climate
Adaptation Trust (SeyCCAT), and it will
support improved management of coasts,
reefs and mangroves; repayment of the
impact investors; and capitalization of
SeyCCAT’s endowment.
One of the largest global conservation
organizations,TNC employs about 3,200
people worldwide.The nonprofit has more
than 1 million members and its revenues
for the year ending June 30, 2015 were
$957 million.
Business Model Innovation: Energy
and Carbon Management
ChargePoint, the world’s largest elec-
tric vehicle (EV) charging network with
more than 25,000 charging points in the
United States, for leading the transforma-
tion to electrified personal transport by
providing networked charging stations
and mobile apps that allow EV drivers to
plan their travel and refuel with greater
freedom and security.
In 2015, ChargePoint teamed up with
Green Charge Networks to start deploy-
ing battery storage systems at charg-
ing points.This feature may be critical
for charging station operators to avoid
economically crippling demand charges
from local electric utilities. It will also be
important to maintaining grid stability
as electric vehicles gain larger shares of
vehicle markets. According to Greentech-
Media.com, by Q3 2015, the two firms
had already backed up five EV charging
stations in Redwood City, Calif.They saw
a reduction in annual demand charges
(based on peak demand at any point over
a year) by $7,000.
Two of ChargePoint’s latest innova-
tions are a multi-family service in which
drivers can get EV charging in their
assigned parking spot and a networked
residential charger that works with the
Nest smart thermostat and is managed
with the ChargePoint mobile app.
7. Climate Change Business Journal 71st Quarter 2016 MarketIntelligenceonClimateChange
Business Model Innovation: Smart
Grid and Energy Management
Green Mountain Power for offering its
customers Tesla Powerwall 7 kWh batter-
ies for onsite storage of power generated
with solar PV or off-peak grid power.
During an outage, the battery is “able to
power essential parts of the home like
lights, a refrigerator, and heat pump” or oil
or gas heating system, according to Green
Mountain Power.
While the backup power will certainly
appeal to many in the cold Vermont win-
ters, green energy advocates are excited
about the innovative business model: an
investor-owned utility selling its custom-
ers an onsite storage option that can make
them more independent and let them use
more self-generated PV power.This is the
kind of distributed residential electric-
ity storage system that will be needed to
accommodate large growth of distributed
PV power.
Green Mountain Power has ordered
500 Powerwalls and expects to start in-
stallation in February 2016.The utility is
selling the Powerwalls for $6500 with an
option to receive a $32/month bill credit
in exchange for giving the utility “shared
access” to use the battery to meet local
electricity demand. Leasing is available for
$1.25 per day.
Green Mountain Power is the inves-
tor-owned utility for Vermont, with $506
million in annual revenue through Q2
2015. It is a certified B corporation, com-
mitted to “using the power of business to
alleviate poverty, address climate changes,
and build strong local communities and
great places to work.”
Advancing Best Practices: Climate
Change Adaptation and Resilience
EcoAdapt for providing valuable
support, training and assistance to local
adaptation practitioners in the public and
private sectors. EcoAdapt manages the
Climate Adaptation Knowledge Exchange
(CAKE) and was the primary sponsor
of the May 2015 National Adaptation
Forum attended by about 800 people.
EcoAdapt’s State of Adaptation initia-
tive produces case studies and synthesizes
lessons learned through interviews with
and surveys of adaptation practitioners.
In 2015, these surveys included assessing
adaptation efforts in the Southeast and
U.S. Caribbean water resources and U.S.
marine fisheries management. Studies
and reports developed from these projects
will be released in 2016 after undergoing
external peer review.
Also in 2015, EcoAdapt worked with
SeaPlan, the City of Boston and The
Boston Harbor Association to develop an
adaptation indicators framework to track
and evaluate climate-related progress
within the city. Finally, EcoAdapt’s Avail-
able Science Assessment Project aims to
apply scientific knowledge to increase the
effectiveness of adaptation actions, with
its first test case examining the role of fire
treatments in Northwest national forests
and communities.
Nonprofit EcoAdapt has a staff of 10
and is funded primarily by grants and
sponsorships. Its support and revenue in
2014 was $2 million.
Environmental Science Associates for
its work and research on using nature-
based approaches—sometimes known
as “green infrastructure”—to stabilize
shorelines and mitigate erosion of vulner-
able coastal communities and ecosystems.
The firm has worked with Monterey
Bay groups to evaluate and model how
“soft” engineering solutions would
perform vs. hard engineered structures
like revetments. And for San Francisco
Bay communities facing sea level rise
and requirements to upgrade wastewater
treatment facilities, ESA developed green
infrastructure approaches that use marshes
to address contaminant issues and provide
defenses against sea level rise.
ESA is one of three environmental
consulting and engineering firms to col-
laborate with The Nature Conservancy
on green infrastructure in the Gulf of
Mexico, also partners with the State of
California and TNC’s Coastal Resilience
Program to map future coastal hazards.
Wetland carbon, also known as blue
carbon, for GHG mitigation and ad-
aptation to sea level rise is a particular
strength of ESA’s. In a report for Restore
America’s Estuaries, ESA quantified car-
bon sequestration and coastal protection
benefits of wetlands restoration activities,
using Washington’s Snohomish River
estuary in Puget Sound as a case study.
In August 2015, ESA, its clients and
partners celebrated the culmination of
many years of work on the Qwuloolt
Estuary near the mouth of the Snohom-
ish River as tidal waters flowed into 350
acres of restored, formerly diked wetlands.
In October 2015, ESA and partners
Research Planning Inc. and Industrial
Economics were selected by the U.S.
Department of the Treasury to perform
scientific and technical reviews of Gulf
Coast Restoration projects.
Environmental science and planning
firm ESA has more than 350 people
working in 13 offices across the West and
in Florida.
Southeast Florida Regional Climate
Change Compact for advancing the
understanding of climate change impacts
and supporting cooperative solutions in a
region of the United States that is highly
vulnerable to rising sea levels and higher
storm surges.
A coalition of Broward, Miami-Dade,
Monroe and Palm Beach counties, the
Compact set out in 2009 to create “a new
form of regional climate governance” and
to support their mutual efforts—and those
of the jurisdictions within their borders—
to plan for and adapt to climate change.
The Compact produced a Regional
8. 8 Climate Change Business Journal 1st Quarter 2016Market Intelligence on Climate Change
Climate Action Plan in 2012, followed by
a series of implementation guidelines and
workshops such as the 2014 guidance for
stormwater management.
To ensure that major infrastructure
projects and planning efforts through-
out the region incorporate a consistent
regional sea level rise projection in design
and develop risk-informed adaptation
strategies for the region, the Compact
issued its first Unified Sea Level Rise
Projection in 2011.
In October 2015, its Sea Level Rise
Work Group—17 scientists and engineers
from governments and universities in the
region— updated the projections to reflect
the latest scientific research; to follow
federal guidance using 1992 as a base year;
and to extend projections from 2060 to
2100.The work group also added an upper
boundary curve (based on NOAA projec-
tions) for high risk critical infrastructure
projects expected to be in use after 2060
(for more, see bit.ly/1VezFK5).
While the report highlights the ex-
traordinary long-term risks for Southeast
Florida—where high tides already push
sea water up into stormwater systems,
even on rain-free sunny days—at least
with the Compact, governments, property
owners and residents have the benefit
of robust information and a cooperative
framework in which to plan for adapta-
tion.
Swiss RE for quantifying the economic
value of adaptation and resilience mea-
sures. Long active in climate change, the
global reinsurance company was a founder
of the ClimateWise Alliance and an early
supporter of the R4 Rural Resilience
Initiative which is selling crop insurance
for climate resilience and adaptation in
Ethiopia, Senegal, Malawi and Zambia.
Swiss Re made climate change a “pri-
ority issue 20 years ago,” according to its
2014 financial report. It created a climate
change strategy focused on: advancing
understanding of climate risks in order to
quantify and integrate them into under-
writing; developing products and services
to migitate GHGs and adapt to climate
change; raising awareness and public
advocacy; and tackling its own carbon
footprint.
Through the Economics of Climate
Adaptation (ECA) studies, Swiss Re and
its collaborators have estimated the total
climate risks facing more than 20 vulner-
able regions and cities and identified the
most cost-effective measures to address
the risks.
In a December 2015 presentation at
COP21, Swiss Re’s David Bresch dis-
cussed ECA studies for Bangladesh’s
Barisal province and for San Salvador’s
Acelhuate River region.The analyses es-
timated the long-term cost-benefit ratios
of more than a dozen adaptation measures
appropriate for each geography, ranging
from deepening drainage canals to reset-
tling slum dwellers. For each measure,
the upfront costs are weighed against the
likely avoided damages by 2040, allow-
ing local governments and aid agencies to
invest in the measures with the best ROI.
Swiss Re’s partners in the ECA work
group include the Global Environment
Facility, McKinsey, the Rockefeller and
ClimateWorks foundations, the European
Commission and Standard Chartered
Bank.
Swiss Re is the world’s second largest
reinsurance firm (after Munich Re) with
$3.5 billion in 2014 revenues.
Advancing Best Practices: Wind/
Solar Integration
Advanced Energy Economy Institute
and The Brattle Group for their June
2015 case study, Integrating Renewable
Energy into the Electricity Grid, which
explores how Electric Reliability Coun-
cil of Texas (ERCOT) and Xcel Energy
Colorado are integrating variable renew-
able energy (primarily wind power) into
their regional grids.
ERCOT and Xcel Energy Colorado
already manage large volumes of wind
power while matching generation with
demand in real time—an ironclad physical
law of electricity grids.To allow continued
growth of renewable power as envisioned
under the federal Clean Power Plan and
state renewable power mandates, other
grid operators will have to contend with
the same challenges that these two grid
operators are facing successfully.
At 12.5 GW of wind turbine capac-
ity, ERCOT is the biggest user of wind
energy in North America; and Xcel
Energy Colorado meets close to 20% of
its average load with wind energy and
experiences periods when wind energy is
meeting more than half of demand, ac-
cording to the report.
The two grid operators are managing
the variability of wind power with “well-
established and widely available methods
and technologies,” including: Ancillary
services provided by flexible gas turbines,
demand response and storage; the evolv-
ing reliability capabilities of renewable
generators; and expansion of transmission
infrastructure.
While ERCOT and Xcel Energy
Colorado demonstrate what’s possible
with existing methods, authors Jürgen
Weiss and Bruce Tsuchida aver that
for renewable power to keep growing,
“continued significant planning and effort,
as well as investment [will be needed]
in transmission infrastructure to bring
electricity from renewable resource rich
locations to load centers, and in distribu-
tion infrastructure.”
“Bringing additional renewable
resources to market will thus likely be an
important additional driver of planning
and building a 21st century grid, which
is also driven by changes on the demand
side … (including distributed generation,
but also new sources of demand and op-
tions for demand-side flexibility), chang-
ing population densities, the desire to
9. Climate Change Business Journal 91st Quarter 2016 MarketIntelligenceonClimateChange
further increase inter-regional intercon-
nections, cybersecurity concerns, the aging
of existing transmission and distribution
infrastructure, etc.”
AEEI is the nonprofit educational
division of clean energy trade group,
Advanced Energy Economy. Brattle is a
research and consulting firm specializing
in electric power, oil and gas, healthcare,
financial services, telecom and transporta-
tion.
Technology Merit: Climate Change
Risk Modeling and Assessment
CH2M for providing program man-
agement for the Miami-Dade County
Water and Sewer Department’s $3.3 bil-
lion Ocean Outfall Legislation Program.
The 11-year program with 28 capital
projects is the culmination of a regulatory
mandate by the Florida Legislature to
stop all wastewater discharge to the ocean
by 2025.
This task included assessment of pro-
jected changes for key climate variables
(sea level rise, precipitation, and wind);
modeling the extent of inundation due
to sea level rise, storm surge, and extreme
rainfall for a range of scenarios based on
the service life of wastewater facilities;
evaluating risks to those facilities from the
different climate change scenarios; and
estimating the associated costs of protect-
ing facilities.
Using its analyses of costs versus risk,
CH2M facilitated a series of workshops
with Miami WASD staff and design
consultants to select design criteria that
specifies flood control elevations and facil-
ity hardening options.These were docu-
mented in a Design Guide for Hardening
Wastewater Facilities against Flooding
from Surge, Sea Level Rise, and Extreme
Rainfall.These measures are now being
used by all of WASD’s consultants, and
they will undergo revision and enhance-
ment as lessons are learned from each
design effort.
Project Merit: Climate Change
Adaptation and Resilience
Four Twenty Seven for helping health-
care institutions understand and plan for
climate change. While most work around
climate adaptation and resilience has fo-
cused on infrastructure and the built envi-
ronment, healthcare services will also have
to respond to increasing health risks from
heat waves, shifting insect populations
and other impacts of climate changes.
In 2015, Four Twenty Seven executed
two healthcare projects: A web-based
Heat Vulnerability application that lets
health professionals explore how climate
change and heat vulnerability will affect
every U.S. county; and the Resilient
Hospital Dashboard that allows hospi-
tal administrators to assess risks to their
facilities and the patients most exposed to
climate change.
The Heat Vulnerability Index (427mt.
com/heat-vulnerability/) ranks every
U.S. county’s heat risk based on heat &
humidity, social vulnerability, medical
access and the physical environment. Four
Twenty Seven developed the application
as part of its commitment to the White
House Climate Data Initiative.
For the Resilient Hospital Dashboard,
Four Twenty Seven worked with health-
care networks and Healthcare With-
out Harm, a nonprofity that promotes
environmentally responsible health care.
The private dashboard enables healthcare
networks to identify hotspots, key driv-
ers of risk and climate impacts faced by
their hospitals. It combines local climate
projections with analytics to help hospitals
understand how climate change impacts
will affect their populations.
Four Twenty Seven is a boutique
climate change consultancy focused on
adaptation and resilience.
AECOM for using the Disaster Resil-
ience Scorecard it developed with IBM to
lead an assessment of the disaster resil-
ience planning process with Bandung, the
capital city of Indonesia’s West Java prov-
ince.The city of over 2.5 million people
faces environmental climate change risks
from flooding and severe storms as well as
fire and earthquakes.
AECOM facilitated a workshop with
over 60 government representatives and
used the scorecard to formulate and
develop disaster risk reduction plans.The
analysis revealed that major water and
sanitation infrastructure systems were
at risk and that a local disaster manage-
ment agency is needed. Additionally, the
resilience of surrounding farmland areas
must be considered for food security in
disasters.
The results of the scorecard and disas-
ter planning were presented by Band-
ung Mayor Ridwan Kamal at the 2015
Summit for Better Cities in New York.
As a next step, the scorecard is now being
adopted by six other cities in West Java to
conduct disaster risk assessments.
Global planning, consulting, design
and engineering firm AECOM had rev-
enue of $18 billion in its fiscal year ending
September 30, 2015.
ConocoPhillips and Tierra Resources
for the success of a three-year pilot project
to plant mangroves to protect against
wetland erosion and hurricane surge in
coastal Louisiana where the firm owns
approximately 636,000 acres of wetlands.
These wetlands, which face some of the
fastest rates of wetland loss in the world,
protect coastal communities as well as
seafood, maritime trade and oil and gas
industries.
Due to increasing temperatures, black
mangroves had already started to expand
northward over several decades into coast-
al salt marshes of Louisiana, where they
are expected to decrease wetland erosion
and provide better storm surge protection.
However, the dispersal of mangrove seeds,
10. 10 Climate Change Business Journal 1st Quarter 2016Market Intelligence on Climate Change
referred to as propagules, has been limited
to wetlands bordering coastal waters, leav-
ing internal marshes largely unpopulated
by mangroves.
The mangrove planting pilot project
succeeded in using a crop-duster airplane
to distribute propagules and establish
mangroves on three one-acre sites in
Lafourche and Terrebonne parishes. Ac-
cording to Tierra Resources, this is first
successful test of air seeding mangroves,
a method that is much more cost- and
labor-efficient than manual planting and
can be replicated in other areas of the
world.
The world’s largest independent
exploration and production company,
ConocoPhillips had $55.5 billion in
2014 revenues. Founded in 2007,Tierra
Resources LLC (New Orleans) is a small
firm focused on researching, develop-
ing and monetizing the “blue carbon” in
coastal wetland ecosystems.
Project Merit: Low-Carbon Energy
Stanford University for its Stanford
Energy Systems Innovations (SESI)
project which replaces the university’s gas-
fired combined heat and power central
plant—once considered the best option
for campus electricity and heating—with
a $485 million district energy system that
uses hot water instead of steam. In a deal
with SunPower, the campus will also
deploy over 70 MW of solar PV capacity,
68 MW off campus. Under construction
since 2013, SESI is expected to be com-
plete in 2016.
SESI will capture waste heat from
evaporative cooling towers using three
2,500-ton heat recovery chillers and use
three 60,000 pound gas-fired hot water
generators to meet winter peak heating
loads. Also included: 10 million gallons
of chilled water tanks and 2 million gal-
lons of hot water tanks providing ther-
mal energy storage, which Stanford will
use—along with controls and predictive
analytics software co-developed with
Johnson Controls—to operate in Califor-
nia wholesale electricity markets.
In addition to Johnson Controls, SESI
was developed with help from consulting
firms Affiliated Engineers, COWI (Den-
mark) and FVB (Sweden). Jacobs Carter
Burgess, Enginomix, Black & Veatch and
Navigant provided peer reviews.
Project Merit: GHG Mitigation
Tetra Tech for completing the five-
year, $41.5 million USAID project
Indonesia Forestry and Climate Support
(IFACS) program.Through IFACS,Tetra
Tech developed a scalable framework to
serve as a model to significantly reduce
Indonesia’s GHG emissions through
conservation of carbon-rich forests and
peatlands.
Tetra Tech worked with all levels of
Indonesia’s government and private sector
to empower Indonesians to engage in
managing their natural resources.Tetra
Tech conducted rigorous site selection
exercises, GIS mapping and vulnerability
assessments to identify solutions to reduce
GHG emissions and conserve Indonesia’s
forests, biodiversity and ecosystems. Over
the life of the project, IFACS contrib-
uted to the sequestration of more than 5
million tons of carbon dioxide, supported
the sustainable management of 1.5 mil-
lion hectares of forest, conserved 230,000
hectares of mangroves and helped 12,000
farmers convert to higher-value crops.The
successful implementation of this program
helped Tetra Tech win the $47-million
follow-on project known as LESTARI.
Consulting and engineering firm Tetra
Tech generated $3 billion in revenues for
the year ending September 27, 2015.
Industry Leadership
AECOM for its extensive global
practice in climate change adaptation and
resilience. In 2015, AECOM delivered 35
climate adaptation and resilience projects
in 20 countries, chaired sessions at global
forums, participated in panels at COP21
in Paris and worked alongside UN agen-
cies, World Bank, Rockefeller Founda-
tion and other influential entities on
global programs and initiatives. AECOM
also completed an update of the UN’s Ten
Essentials of Disaster Risk Reduction.
The year saw AECOM publish its
Becoming Climate Resilient guide for
private sector companies and the new
book What’s Next In Making Cities
Resilient, as well as contributung to the
NIST Community Resilience Plan-
ning Guide. AECOM and partner IBM
received the 2015 Notre Dame Global
Adaptation Index (ND-GAIN) Corpo-
rate Adaptation Prize for their UNISDR
Disaster Resilience Scorecard, which has
been adapted for small businesses and is
piloting in New Orleans.
One of AECOM’s most notable
climate adaptation resilience projects is
its work to help Miami Beach protect its
built environment from rising sea levels
and flooding. In international projects,
AECOM completed the International
Climate Change Adaptation Framework
for Road Infrastructure for the World
Road Association’s (PIARC).The frame-
work helps road infrastructure managers
identify assets and networks vulnerable
to climate change, prioritize the risks, de-
velop adaptation responses and integrate
those into decision-making.
Additionally, AECOM developed new
climate adaptation technologies, includ-
ing an economic framework for analyzing
adaptation options and predictive model-
ing for sea-level rise, coastal erosion and
riverine flooding. After acquiring URS
and Hunt Construction Group in 2014,
AECOM’s annual revenues for the year
ending September 30, 2015 were $18
billion.
PwC for integrating GHG mitiga-
tion and climate change adaptation and
resilience into its client services, growth
11. Climate Change Business Journal 111st Quarter 2016 MarketIntelligenceonClimateChange
strategy and thought leadership. One of
the largest global professional services
companies, PwC provides consulting and
advisory services to large clients around
climate and disaster resilience, carbon
markets, low-carbon energy, climate-
smart agriculture, sustainable development
and other topics.The firm’s international
sustainability and climate change practice
includes over 700 specialists. In its 2015
Global Annual Review, PwC highlighted
“Climate Change and Resource Scarcity”
as one of five megatrends “shaping and
disrupting the global economic landscape
and society.”
PwC is driving the global conversation
about climate risk in business and public
policy, and it works with financial services
and insurance clients demonstrating how
and why climate risk should be more
integrated into investment and insurance
portfolios. In 2015, PwC was engaged
again as the independent reviewer for
ClimateWise, for whom it analyzed the
climate risk management performance of
participating insurance companies. And
PwC executives spoke at the New York
Climate Summit in support of the 1-in-
100 initiative that would “provide new
and robust climate related information for
investors, corporates, governments, rating
agencies, and dare I say it, regulators,” ac-
cording to PwC’s Malcolm Preston.
Also in 2015, PwC published its
seventh Low Carbon Economy Index,
evaluating the emissions reductions trajec-
tories embodied in the national commit-
ments that ultimately became part of the
Paris agreement. PwC’s analysis indicates
that the aggregate national commitments
will achieve less than half of the annual
emissions reductions needed to limit
global average temperature increases to 2°
C. It also estimated that China and the
EU alone will invest $700 billion a year to
achieve their decarbonisation goals.
Multinational professional services
firm PwC reported global revenues of
$35.4 billion for its financial year ending
30 June 2015.
NGO Award
Georgetown Climate Center for its
support of local government efforts to
plan for and adapt to climate change
impacts including increased flooding,
drought and extreme heat. One of GCC’s
focus areas is green infrastructure to
manage stormwater in the face of chang-
ing precipitation patterns, and it works
with city and federal officials and NGOs
to develop strategies to implement these
approaches.
GCC has produced case studies of
adaptation initiatives in transportation
infrastructure and cities, including a
comparison of the efforts of three U.S.
and three Chinese jurisdictions. In August
2015, the center published Reimagining
New Orleans after Katrina, describing
how the city adapted the design and func-
tion of public schools and water systems
to create a more resilient city.
GCC aided state and local govern-
ments in applying for HUD’s $1 billion
National Disaster Resilience Competi-
tion.The organization also hosts the
Adaptation Clearinghouse in partnership
with the American Society of Adapta-
tion Professionals, the Urban Sustain-
ability Directors Network and EPA.The
clearinghouse was recently upgraded
to let users monitor states’ progress in
adaptation planning and will soon boast
new functionality to support adaptation
practitioners in local governments and
water utilities.
GCC partners with many other NGOs
and research outfits, including the Na-
tional Center for Atmospheric Research,
Rutgers Climate Institute and Old
Dominion University. Its major funders
include the Kresge, MacArthur and
Rockefeller foundations and the Federal
Highway Administration.
The Notre Dame Global Adaptation
Index (ND-GAIN) for achieving a higher
profile for its analyses of the relative
climate-readiness of nations, and for in-
creasing its support for public and private
sector leaders to priortize adaptation and
resilience investments. Covered in the UK
newspaper The Independent, Business
Insider, HuffingtonPost and other media
prior to COP21, ND-GAIN’s November
2015 country index release included new
visualization tools covering 20 years of
data across 180 countries.
In 2015, ND-GAIN also began pilot
Urban Adaptation Assessments in Bal-
timore, Los Angeles, Memphis, Seattle
and Davenport, Iowa, and it hosted global
adaptation webinars in Spanish and Man-
darin. In conjunction with Four Twenty
Seven and Business for Social Respon-
sibility, ND-GAIN published a study of
corporate adaptation that identified water
scarcity as the top concern of corporations
surveyed.
ND-GAIN’s major funders include the
Natural Gas Partners Foundation, Kresge
Foundation, Templeton Foundation and
the International Initiative for Impact
Evaluation. R
12. 12 Climate Change Business Journal 1st Quarter 2016Market Intelligence on Climate Change
Ernst Basler + Partner
Sees Growth Driven by
Paris Agreements, Climate
Impacts
Q&A with Denise Fussen, team leader
in climate change mitigation and
adaptation
E
rnst Basler + Partner is a
Switzerland-based consulting
firm with expertise in planning,
engineering, construction, IT and com-
munications. From offices in Switzer-
land, Germany, Brazil, Chile and Hong
Kong, the firm has a growing business in
climate change mitigation, risk assessment
and adaptation planning, driven by the
“increasing interest in consultancy on this
topic among our customers,” according to
its website.
Most of Ernst Basler + Partner’s work
around climate change adaptation is for
local, regional and national governments,
with engagements across Switzerland and
a major international project in the Jinsha
River Basin in China where the firm
is quantifying the influence of climate
change on water resources and developing
adaptation measures.
A private family-owned firm founded
by Ernst Basler in 1981, Ernst Basler +
Partner has approximately 350 employees
in its Swiss and German offices and 200
spread across its Brazilian, Chilean and
Hong Kong offices. CCBJ spoke with De-
nise Fussen, team leader in climate change
mitigation and adaptation.
CCBJ: While the details of its imple-
mentation are still evolving, the Paris
agreement sets ambitious goals for
GHG mitigation and adaptation. What
are your thoughts on what the agreement
means for your clients?
Fussen: In Switzerland, efforts regard-
ing climate change mitigation started
within the Kyoto Protocol and are defined
in the current CO2-law, which includes
a CO2-tax on combustion fuels and
a domestic Emission Trading System.
Switzerland is starting the revision of its
CO2-law for the period after 2020 and
the results of the Paris agreement are an
important aspect for its design and the
surrounding political discussion.
Also on the international level, the
efforts for climate change mitigation and
adaptation will be strengthened and more
financing will be available on the long
term. In combination with the growing
impacts of climate change, this will create
more demand from impacted countries as
well as international organizations.
Our national and international clients
will need more support for climate change
services in mitigation and adaptation.
We also expect that not only the national
governments and multilateral actors will
demand these services, but also regional
and local governments and private com-
panies.
CCBJ: What’s the scope of your work
in GHG mitigation and climate change
adaptation?
Fussen: We have two departments that
are working most extensively on climate
change: our Resources, Energy + Climate
division and our Safety + Security divi-
sion.
The Resources, Energy + Climate
division, where I am working, is active
in developing climate change mitigation
measures in Switzerland. So we support
the Federal Office of Environment around
different policy instruments, for examples,
the Emission Trading System, the volun-
tary emission reductions for companies
to be exempted from the CO2-tax and
as an accredited validator and verifier for
projects within our domestic offsetting
scheme.
The Safety + Security division does risk
and security analyses on many different
subjects, and they have developed a semi-
quantitative method to assess climate
change risks and adaptation opportunities
in Switzerland for the Federal Office of
the Environment.This has been applied in
different cantons representing the differ-
ent zones in Switzerland with the idea to
aggregate the results on a national level.
It was a new methodology, based
on expert interviews and also statisti-
cal information. It covers nine different
sectors, from water and natural hazards to
biodiversity, identifying the major climate
risks and their likely quantitative impacts.
Both departments together with other
departments of Ernst Basler + Partner are
working on climate change adaptation
for the Federal Office of Environment
and different cantons. So we supported
for example the canton of Graubünden
in its’ climate report, and currently we’re
developing a climate adaptation strategy
with the canton of Solothurn.
CCBJ: How many full-time equivalent
employees from Ernst Basler + Partner
work on climate change?
Fussen: In climate change mitigation,
our team currently counts four full-time
and around four part-time employees.
In adaptation, the workload depends
on the projects. At the moment we have a
contract to identify risks and opportuni-
ties and develop an adaptation strategy
for one canton, and there are four persons
working on it. Our flood risk manage-
ment project in China’s Jinsha River Basin
Project has evolved into a full-fledged
adaptation project, with between 10 and
15 people involved on a part time level.
I’d say now over the whole company
we’re between 15 and 20 people working
on adaptation issues, although in many
cases the contracts are not specifically for
adaptation but something like flood risks,
for which we obviously have to address
adaptation.
CCBJ: How are your climate projects
funded?
13. Climate Change Business Journal 131st Quarter 2016 MarketIntelligenceonClimateChange
Fussen: Our projects in Switzerland
are funded by the respective clients as
for example the Federal Office of Envi-
ronment or the specific canton. On the
international level, the projects are funded
by multilateral banks or aid agencies such
as the Swiss Agency for Development
and Cooperation, which is funding the
Chinese project.
CCBJ: Who are some of your primary
competitors for these kinds of projects?
Fussen: It depends on the issue and the
location. In Switzerland, we are compet-
ing with other consulting companies
with a similar focus such as Infras, First
Climate or the South Pole Group.These
companies are also active on the interna-
tional level and are often our competitors,
especially in international tenders of the
Swiss agencies.
“Our national and international
clients will need more support
for climate change services in
mitigation and adaptation.”
In South America, where we’re devel-
oping our business mostly around climate
change mitigation, we’re competing with
Swiss, German and international consult-
ing companies and NGOs such as Swiss
Helvetas Intercooperation, Swisscontact
and Climate Focus. Generally we’re not
competing with engineering companies
like CH2M but organizations with a
focus on climate change and/or interna-
tional aid and development.
CCBJ: What kinds of budget ranges do
these projects generally have?
Fussen: Projects are usually in the
range of CHF 30,000 to 120,000
(USD$30,000 to $120,000 at exchange
rates in effect at the time this text was
written), although large projects can be
significantly more.
CCBJ: How do you expect the market
for climate change consulting to evolve
over the next couple of years?
Fussen: Internationally, we see that the
aspect of climate change mitigation and
adaptation is growing and will continue
to grow because of the Paris agreement
and because the impacts will start to be
seen more and more. We also expect to
see multilateral agencies increase their
budgets for climate change adaptation in
addition to the funding levels for climate
change mitigation.
In Switzerland for the moment, the
market is mostly driven by the federal
government that is putting incentives and
money into climate change mitigation and
adaptation planning and exerting pressure
on the different actors. I have the impres-
sion that the government is trying to
include adaptation into the normal busi-
ness and bring it to the regional and local
governmental levels and the private sector.
For example, for flood risk management
they will not perform climate adaptation
analyses separately but will try to include
activities for adaptation into the overall
project. R
With Strong Policy and
Business Drivers, E&E Sees
Growing Global Market for
GHG Mitigation, Adaptation
Q&A with SeniorVice President of
Development Cheryl Karpowicz
E
cology and Environment is a
mid-sized environmental consult-
ing and engineering firm with
about 850 employees, including more than
300 in Brazil, Peru and other countries
in the Americas. E&E addresses green-
house gas (GHG) mitigation and climate
change resilience and adaptation through
a variety of service sectors, including
energy, natural resource management and
restoration, water resources, planning
and regulatory compliance for public and
private sector clients.
Over the last couple of years, E&E has
stepped up its strategic focus on climate
adaptation and resilience, highlighting
“Sustainability, Resiliency and Climate
Adaptation” in its 2015 annual report.
“We help organizations and government
agencies to become more resilient by as-
sisting them to plan for, respond to, and
recover from extreme disruptive events,”
states the report, citing work for the New
York Rising Community Reconstruction
Program and Colorado Resiliency Frame-
work plan. CCBJ discussed the firm’s
evolving business around climate change
with Senior Vice President of Develop-
ment Cheryl Karpowicz.
CCBJ: What is the full scope of your
services related to GHG mitigation and
climate change resilience and adapta-
tion?
Karpowicz: Much of what we do in
energy and planning addresses GHG
mitigation and/or climate change resil-
ience and adaptation: pipelines that enable
power generators to switch from coal to
natural gas; wind and solar power plants
that avoid construction of new fossil fuel
14. 14 Climate Change Business Journal 1st Quarter 2016Market Intelligence on Climate Change
power plants; and infrastructure plans
that show communities how they can
tap natural ecosystem services to become
more resilient in the face of sea level rise
or extreme weather events.
Domestically much of our traditional
emergency planning work now specifically
addresses vulnerable populations that are
most at risk, as does a growing share of
our international energy siting work.
E&E’s ecological restoration work
enables GHG mitigation and adaptation
to climate change. We also provide GHG
inventories, net zero energy use planning,
and asset management systems.
CCBJ: Where are you seeing the stron-
gest growth, and where is growth most
challenging?
Karpowicz: Our strongest growth has
been in the public sector and, surprisingly,
with the U.S. military, which has recog-
nized climate change resilience and adap-
tation to be a critical component of strong
national security. For example, the Navy
set ambitious renewable energy goals to
ensure energy independence. Under a $7
million contract, we enabled the Navy to
exceed its goal of 1 Gigawatt of primarily
solar renewable energy, in procurement at
the end of 2015, with more to go in 2016.
Similarly, within the Army/US Army
Corps of Engineers, we are seeing renew-
able energy goals and installation mas-
ter plan directives aligning around the
concept of Net Zero, which means that an
installation uses only as much energy as it
can generate on-site, preferably via renew-
able sources. We are working with the
USACE to integrate our Comprehensive
Asset Master Planning System (CAMPS)
with the Army’s Net Zero Planner (NZP)
tool, helping installation planners and
energy managers develop building- and
installation-wide scenarios to achieve
DoD energy efficiency and net zero goals.
Coastal communities, where nearly
40% of the U.S. population lives, are
focusing more attention and funding on
vulnerability analysis and adaptation plan-
ning.The Gulf Coast region is receiving
RESTORE Act and other funding related
to the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill, a
portion of which is being directed to state
and local government resiliency planning.
Non-profits have a role in and can
stimulate this market. E&E participated
in the Rockefeller sponsored Resiliency
Academies. Similarly, through the 100
Resilient Cities Network, the Rockefeller
Foundation enables selected cities to hire
a Chief Resilience Officer, and the result-
ing plans and projects will stimulate this
market.
Growth is most challenging in the
private sector where in most of the world,
you can readily see that the largest GHG
emitters are in power and energy produc-
tion as well as transportation and other
industries. Acknowledging the need for
GHG mitigation and climate adaptation
services challenges many of our clients’
current business model at a time when
market conditions are not conducive to
new expenditures. However, organiza-
tions such as the Business Environmental
Leadership Council also are helping in-
dustry to better recognize and meet these
challenges.
Every time an extreme weather event
occurs, businesses suffer losses, often
significant ones. As more companies
experience expensive exposures to extreme
weather events and their consequences,
they will be more willing to expend
money on services that make them more
resilient and better able to adapt to cli-
mate change in the future.
CCBJ: What are your thoughts on what
the Paris agreement means for your
clients and your firm?
Karpowicz: The United States’ prin-
ciple strategy for meeting the GHG
reduction goals of the Paris Climate
Accord is the Clean Power Plan (CPP),
which grants states tremendous flexibil-
ity in implementation, including the use
of market-based approaches to reduce
GHGs in the power sector. With our
cross-sector experience, we can not only
assist clients in meeting the emission
targets in the CPP but also support them
in developing sustainable business plans
that will help them address a climate chal-
lenged future.
We also expect new opportunities to
support reducing emissions and building
resilience to climate change impacts will
emerge in developing countries.
CCBJ: What are some of your notable
recent or upcoming projects around cli-
mate change resilience and adaptation?
Karpowicz: E&E led the State of
Alaska’s efforts to develop emergency
plans and training for six remote low-
lying Alaskan villages that had been iden-
tified as particularly vulnerable to climate
change impacts including increasingly
severe storms, coastal erosion, permafrost
thaws, river erosion, flooding and fires.
For the Colorado Resiliency Frame-
work, E&E conducted vulnerability and
risk assessments and stakeholder engage-
ment to develop the state’s resiliency plan,
the first of its kind in the nation. We’ve
since worked with local jurisdictions
to develop tailored resiliency plans and
identify implementable and cost-effective
projects.
E&E is about to initiate pre-con-
struction monitoring for a large living
shoreline project sponsored by The Nature
Conservancy. We also work with indus-
try groups to advance best practices. For
example, E&E is a founding corporate
sponsor of the International Sea Level
Institute, a new non-profit global leader-
ship center tackling the challenge of rising
sea level.
CCBJ: How has your renewable en-
ergy work changed over the last couple
years and what are you expecting for the
future?
15. Climate Change Business Journal 151st Quarter 2016 MarketIntelligenceonClimateChange
Karpowicz: Domestically, after the fail-
ure to renew the PTC in 2014, our wind
energy work declined from its high point
with fewer new project starts. However,
during the last year, developers began
siting projects again and work resulted
from established projects that required
specialized services related to birds that
receive special regulatory protection. New
project work also emerged as the industry
consolidated and reorganized.
Solar developers also responded to the
threat that the ITC would be reduced to
15% at the end of 2016 by racing to get
projects into construction and operating
by the deadline. With the recent Christ-
mas present from Congress extending the
ITC and PTC for five years, we anticipate
even stronger activity going forward.
In California, the increase in our
renewable energy portfolio standard from
33% to 50% by 2030 will also stimulate
investment, albeit mostly in smaller PV
projects compared with the huge utility
scale projects that are coming online now.
Other states are a mixed bag, although
we expect that with improvements in
technology and reductions in price, even
states that are wed to coal may be more
receptive to renewable technology as their
obligations under the Clean Power Plan
become clearer.
In Latin America, renewable energy
markets vary depending on national
energy constraints and opportunities. In
Chile, where hydrocarbon fuels are largely
imported, our solar work has developed
nicely and has helped to compensate for
the downturn in mining. Brazil depends
heavily on hydropower, and demand for
solar and wind has been heightened by
the prolonged drought and geographic
imbalances. But other issues are impeding
further renewable development. In con-
trast, Peru has had little interest in solar
due to the availability and recent develop-
ment of vast natural gas resources.
CCBJ: You’ve worked on some marine
hydrokinetic energy (waves, tides, etc.)
projects.That once-promising technol-
ogy seems to have stalled. What’s your
take?
Karpowicz: This market will take time
to develop, given available alternatives and
relative costs of energy. Although signifi-
cant progress has been made in the devel-
opment of marine hydrokinetic (MHK)
technologies, developers are still working
to prove the level of durability, reliability,
and efficiency that is needed for utilities
to sign power purchase agreements for
commercial scale projects.
As population trends and development
in U.S. coastal areas increase, electricity
demand will grow. With contraints on
land-based generation and transmission,
the offshore region will become more
attractive for energy development. We
believe MHK power infrastructure will
be part of meeting the country’s future
energy needs.
CCBJ: Our analysis of the U.S. local
government resilience market showed
it’s still mostly small risk assessment
and planning engagements. For water,
wastewater and transportation engage-
ments, Consultants are often tasked
with incorporating climate change—but
with no additional fee. Do you agree?
What opportunities do you see for grow-
ing your U.S. adaptation and resilience
business in this market?
Karpowicz: Everyone knows that our
infrastructure in the U.S. is in bad shape,
but no clear method to fund upgrades or
even maintain infrastructure has emerged.
While we agree that consultants are being
asked to incorporate climate change with-
out significant additional fees, this in fact
signals that we need to work differently.
Similar to many other environmentally
driven trends, incorporating climate at the
initial project planning stages offers the
opportunity to reduce the lifecycle invest-
ment costs for projects. After all, much of
climate adaptation is good planning and
common sense.
While designing resiliency into exist-
ing cities is our goal, it’s also true that
many cities that have experienced major
traumatic events have emerged stronger
and more resilient, creating new oppor-
tunities in the process.Think of the type
of city San Francisco became after the
1906 earthquake; similarly New Orleans
is being reborn as a much stronger, more
transparent, more successful city.
CCBJ: PPPs are a perennial topic of dis-
cussion around infrastructure projects
in general and related to climate change.
Yet, we continue to hear that PPPs are
very difficult to negotiate and execute
successfully. Any top-of-mind thoughts
or insights into how to make PPPs work
for resilience and adaptation?
Karpowicz: Since other sources of
funding are not available at the scale
needed, PPPs will of necessity become
a more prevalent method to provide for
resilience and adaptation-driven energy,
water, transportation and natural infra-
structure improvements. Not all states
allow PPPs so enabling legislation is
needed.
Private capital is available. However,
existing water and transportation PPPs
have required considerable upfront invest-
ment to structure the terms of the part-
nerships, including liability, insurance and
tax consequences.Then the competitive
process is time consuming and expen-
sive.The developer often does not begin
making a profit until near the end of the
contractual operating life of the asset.
PPPs are not for the faint of heart.
The challenge for adapting PPPs to
resilience and adaptation is providing for
a reasonable ROI that a ‘private’ entity
would realize in return for the invest-
ment up front. It is difficult to calculate
the monetary benefits of investing in
resiliency and adaptation, such as im-
proved public safety and avoiding future
infrastructure damage. Fairly and trans-
16. 16 Climate Change Business Journal 1st Quarter 2016Market Intelligence on Climate Change
parently monetizing those factors up
front is key. ‘Public’ entities will need to
be more flexible and willing to negotiate
with financial/insurance parties, share risk
reasonably, define a clear path and build
the consensus to move forward.
CCBJ: Mining facilities are often highly
vulnerable to a changing climate. How
are these clients responding to climate
change risks, and what are you doing to
help them?
Karpowicz: Extreme weather will
require using more conservative de-
sign standards for mining projects.The
experience-based, 100-year storm may not
be an adequate design basis considering
the increasingly severe storm events that
are trending. For example, shortly after
we finished designing a series of infra-
structure improvements at a large mine in
Chile to the regulatory-required design
standard, which was also specified by the
client, massive flooding far exceeding the
design standard destroyed the improve-
ments and necessitated redesign and
additional work to establish the design
standards that would be protective in
extreme weather events.
CCBJ: You’ve done extensive environ-
mental work for high-voltage electric
transmission projects, including HVDC,
many of them associated with renewable
energy resources. What can you share
about the status and future of this seg-
ment?
Karpowicz: Developing a long distance
HVDC line requires tremendous inge-
nuity and perseverance to overcome the
huge number of potential show stoppers
such projects encounter, from environ-
mental concerns, regulatory hurdles, and
landowner preferences to the upfront and
ongoing financial demands of these large
projects. You have to be willing to go the
distance and find someone to pay for it
while you do.
However, we see shorter HVDC lines,
although expensive, becoming more viable
over time. In addition to transporting
energy, they can be buried and can trans-
form electrical systems into more resilient
networks, two significant benefits.
“While we agree that
consultants are being asked
to incorporate climate change
without significant additional
fees, this signals that we need
to work differently.”
The Clean Power Plan and other
initiatives are spurring a shift in power
generation to low carbon sources that will
require new transmission. Within regu-
lated markets, competitive solicitations,
in compliance with FERC Order 1000,
will continue to grow along with market
efficiency opportunities. Our extensive
permitting work with the New York En-
ergy Highway competitive proceedings as
well as in the California ISO reflects these
opportunities, which we expect to grow in
other markets.
A final trend we see in the transmis-
sion sector is related to ensuring reliabili-
ty—a combination of aging infrastructure
that does not do well in extreme weather
as well as reliability concerns over distrib-
uted generation and intermittent renew-
ables will spur utilities to upgrade their
existing assets.
CCBJ: Finally, as E&E notes in its
annual report, thanks to shale gas, the
U.S. LNG market has changed from
one where import terminals were being
developed to one where export terminals
dominate. From your perspective, hav-
ing worked with clients on offshore and
onshore LNG terminals and pipelines,
what are the key trends shaping the U.S.
LNG market and its demand for envi-
ronmental services?
Karpowicz: Current market conditions
have stimulated a large number of export
projects proposals in the U.S., but not all
of them will be built. In the same way
that independent oil producers now carry
out much of the oil exploration activity,
small, independent entrepreneurial firms
have become highly successful in the
LNG export market.
Many foreign countries with large
natural gas reserves do not have sufficient
infrastructure to cost effectively transport
and process natural gas from their do-
mestic reserves. So they cannot ramp up
shale gas development like we have been
able to do in the U.S.. As such, many of
these countries will likely purchase LNG
from the U.S. until their infrastructure is
sufficiently upgraded.
In addition to planning and permitting,
helping to plan the needed infrastructure
in these countries represents another set
of opportunities. Still other countries do
not have natural gas reserves. In Chile, we
have completed six LNG import projects.
With the advent of Floating Storage
and Regasification Units (FSRU’s), which
are mobile and can be set up on most any
waterbody in the world, smaller develop-
ing countries that previously could not
afford the major investment of a fixed,
land based regasification facility can now
access inexpensive natural gas, much of
which will come from the U.S. This has
the potential to significantly increase the
global customer base for LNG.
Implementation of the North Ameri-
can Emissions Control Area for marine
vessel traffic dramatically reduces the
amount of sulfur permitted in marine
fuels.The use of LNG meets these more
stringent sulfur emissions limits and is
currently priced competitively with high
cost low-sulfur diesel, spurring increased
investment in LNG powered vessels and
construction of LNG marine fueling
facilities. We’ve also assisted environ-
mental permitting for small LNG fueling
facilities. R
17. Climate Change Business Journal 171st Quarter 2016 MarketIntelligenceonClimateChange
Climate Change and
National Security
A Q&A with BGen Stephen Cheney,
American Security Project
T
he American Security Project,
a non-partisan national security
think tank, promotes “honest
dialogue about security that is as robust
as it is realistic,” according to its website.
With a board of business leaders, former
members of Congress, former govern-
ment officials and senior retired military
officers, ASP seeks to educate Americans
to understand “the dangers and opportu-
nities of the 21st century, the spectrum of
available responses, and the benefits and
drawbacks of each course of action.”
Climate change is one of ASP’s top
priorities. CCBJ discussed the group’s
perspective with CEO Stephen Cheney,
retired U.S. Marine Corps Brigadier
General. Cheney’s defense career includes
serving as Deputy Executive Secretary to
Defense Secretaries Cheney (no relation)
and Aspin, serving as Inspector General
of the Marine Corps, and Commander
of Parris Island. Following retirement
from the Marines, Gen. Cheney became
COO of Business Executives for National
Security. A past Military Fellow and cur-
rent member of the Council on Foreign
Relations, Cheney is also a member of the
Secretary of State’s International Secu-
rity Advisory Board and Foreign Affairs
Policy Board.
CCBJ: Where and how is climate change
causing military conflict today?
Cheney: Not many people would asso-
ciate the Arab Spring that began in 2011
with climate change. But in 2010, leading
up to those events, drought, record-high
temperatures and forest fires decimated
the Russian wheat crop which caused the
price of wheat to escalate in the Middle
East, where bread is the main staple.
In Syria, from 2007 to 2011, the coun-
try experienced the worst drought in its
history.That caused significant migrations
of people from agrarian areas to the main
cities, Aleppo being the most prominent.
When the Arab Spring hit there, people
who were upset with the government over
the costs of necessities like food and water
began to protest, which ultimately led to
the civil war.
In Mali, the Tuareg insurrection can
be traced in part to the fact that these
nomadic people had been forced out of
their traditional lands because of severe
drought. Boko Haram has taken advan-
tage of the fact that severe drought has
forced mass migrations in Northern Nige-
ria and surrounding countries. When you
look at aerial photos of Lake Chad (on
the borders of Niger, Nigeria and Chad),
you can see that this water resource has
been dramatically reduced.
Climate change wasn’t the primary
cause of any of these conflicts, but it am-
plified them. It’s a threat multiplier. When
there’s economic instability, when people
aren’t being paid enough and unemploy-
ment grows, particularly among youth,
that fosters instability like we’re seeing in
the Middle East.
CCBJ: Competition for water resources
and large-scale migration of people im-
pacted by climate change seem to be the
two main ways in which climate change
can lead to international conflicts.To
what extent do you agree? What other
climate-related stressors would you rank
in the top security threats, and why?
Cheney: There haven’t been large-scale
massive conflicts caused by the search
for water to date, however, you can see it
coming. When you look at the Nile, most
of Egypt’s population lives predominantly
in regions serviced by water coming from
the Nile. If it’s diverted or declines, that
will be a huge problem.The Tigris and
Euphrates river system supplies water
to Turkey, Syria, Iraq, Iran and Kuwait.
Shortages and problems with that natural
resource would contribute to terrorism
and instability.
The glaciers that provide a huge water
resource for India, Pakistan and China
are receding, and that could lead to a real
problem among three nuclear-armed na-
tions. Pakistan and India have threatened
each other before, and I can conceive
of a time 15 to 20 years down the pike
where there’s going to be a fight for water
resources in that part of the world.That
would be a phenomenal problem.
CCBJ: DOD’s 2014 Adaptation Road-
map looks at many of the same measures
that local governments are considering
or enacting to improve resilience at do-
mestic bases, such as improved manage-
ment of stormwater and water resources.
How can DOD work with local commu-
nities on resilience and adaptation?
Cheney: I’ve had personal experience
with catastrophic weather events and the
need for integrated, regional planning for
climate change adaptation and disaster
response. I was Commanding General at
Parris Island in South Carolina in 1999
when Hurricane Floyd threatened.The
island is only 15’ or 16’ above sea level, and
the predicted storm surge was 25’, so I
had to order evacuation of 8,000 or 9,000
personnel. We had a pretty good plan
rehearsed. We’d arranged with the local
school system to use all their buses in an
emergency to move all our recruits and
permanent personnel to Albany, Georgia.
As part of the arrangement, we helped
maintain the buses.
But there was a problem. When you
put 300 or 400 buses on the road in a six-
hour period in a place that doesn’t have
the road infrastructure to handle them,
you’re going to slam that place shut. I had
a difficult time getting the Governor to
declare a State of Emergency so the roads
could become one-way, so we decided to
evacuate before he ultimately declared the
emergency.That turned into one of the
largest traffic jams in the history of the
18. 18 Climate Change Business Journal 1st Quarter 2016Market Intelligence on Climate Change
area.
You have to coordinate all these kinds
of considerations with local governments.
In this event, the Hurricane didn’t hit di-
rectly, so the base avoided major damage.
Hampton Roads in the Norfolk Area is a
good example of the kind of cooperation
that is needed.The civilian community
there fully recognizes the problems they
have with sea level rise and flooding.
They’re working hand in glove with the
military on adaptation measures to deal
with flood events that are going to flood
the bases, stations and towns simultane-
ously.
CCBJ: ASP has created a Global Secu-
rity Defense Index (GSDI) on Climate
Change. Can you describe what the
index reveals so far?
Cheney: Our team went to every em-
bassy in Washington and asked how they
had addressed climate change in their
national security plans. More than 70% of
countries in the world do recognize it as a
threat to their national security. Since that
study, 195 countries stood up at COP21
and said it’s a threat, which validates our
research. Military establishments in all
these countries, including China and
Russia, have recognized the problem.They
understand that they have to do some
long-term planning and adaptation to
climate change.
There’s a huge international compo-
nent to this, especially for the U.S. as the
predominant military power in the world.
Look at Typhoon Haiyan in the Phil-
lipines. We sent 12,000 soldiers, sailors,
airmen and marines to assist after that
disaster, which killed 7,000 people. Why
did we do that? Number one, we’re the
only country with the ability to respond
with those kinds of assets and people in
that time and space. And we did it to
meet humanitarian needs.
As a sideline, since then the Phillipines
has signed a defense agreement with us
and they’re warming back up to the U.S.
I wouldn’t say that’s directly because
of Haiyan. It has a lot has to do with
China, but the U.S. is definitely fostering
cordial relations with vulnerable countries
because of our response to catastrophic
weather events.
CCBJ: What kind of security concerns
does the opening of Arctic sea lanes rep-
resent, especially with respect to Russia?
Cheney: Andrew Holland, our Senior
Fellow for Climate and Energy, has pub-
lished a short paper on this and we hope
to have a report coming out on this in the
Spring. I follow this issue because I sit
on the Secretary of State’s International
Security Advisory Board.
What Russia is planning and doing
regarding the Arctic might surprise some.
Russia looks at climate change and what
it’s doing to open the northern sea routes
as an economic opportunity, not necessar-
ily a military threat.They view it as their
waterways being opened up.They’re going
to have international shipping going
through those waterways, they will earn
revenues from that while taking some
responsibility to protect shipping and
respond to emergencies.
Yes, they are bolstering their Arctic
forces significantly, but it’s important to
note that they’re focused on restoring
their defense capabilities to what they had
in the late ‘70s early ‘80s. Plus they’re a bit
diverted now by places like the Ukraine
and Syria. I see what they’re doing in the
Arctic, and I don’t think it’s a cause for
huge alarm on our military side. I don’t
foresee a military confrontation going on
in the Arctic. It’s more a case of the Rus-
sians protecting their resources.
By the way, under the Law of the Sea
Convention, which the U.S. Congress
won’t ratify, Russia has submitted claims
to parts of the Arctic. But we don’t have a
seat at that table.The same thing is play-
ing out in the South China Sea, yet we’re
one of the only nations not participating
in that discussion. R
ICF: Leading Climate Change
Consultancy Examines
Growth Drivers and
Challenges
Q&A with Anne Choate and Randall
Freed, SVPs
I
CF International’s 5,000 staff
working out of 70 offices worldwide
provide professional services and
technology solutions that deliver benefi-
cial impact in areas critical to the world’s
future. One of the firm’s core areas is
climate change, a topic in which it cred-
ibly claims to have the largest and most
diverse consulting practice in the world.
CCBJ spoke with SVP Anne Choate,
who leads the Climate and Sustainability
business and SVP Randall Freed, leader
for Strategic Growth & Innovation for
the Sustainability & Management Ser-
vices Division, which includes Choate’s
team.
CCBJ: While its implementation will
unfold over several years, the Paris
agreement sets ambitious goals for
GHG mitigation. What are your top
thoughts on what the agreement’s GHG
mitigation goals mean for your clients
and your firm?
ICF: On the mitigation side, 160
countries have submitted INDCs (In-
tended Nationally Determined Contribu-
tions), which represents a real landmark.
All of these countries have at least gotten
through enough of a planning process to
articulate goals.These national pledges
will be reviewed every five years and be-
come gradually more ambitious.
So in many ways, 2015 represents
the year when globally, we shift from an
emphasis on planning to an emphasis on
implementation. Over the past 15 years or
so, we’ve been helping a lot of our more
progressive clients to implement climate
and clean energy programs, and this is
clearly the wave of the future.
19. Climate Change Business Journal 191st Quarter 2016 MarketIntelligenceonClimateChange
Also, woven through the Paris Agree-
ment is the recognition of the key role
played by cities, states, and the private sec-
tor in mitigation.This is a very significant
shift that recognizes the leadership shown
by mayors, governors, and CEOs.
CCBJ: Funding for resilience and
adaptation in vulnerable developing
countries was also a core issue at the
COP21 negotiations in Paris last month.
What were the key takeaways from your
perspective?
ICF: The new agreement is widely
perceived as having more balance between
mitigation and adaptation than previous
ones.There is also recognition within the
agreement that a 2 degree C target (in
terms of increase with respect to pre-
industrial levels) is probably not ambitious
enough; the “1.5 to stay alive” message
from island countries got real traction for
the first time.
It’s also noteworthy how many coun-
tries included resilience measures in their
INDCs. And it’s encouraging that prog-
ress could be made despite the vagueness
in exactly who will pay for what.
CCBJ: USAID and European aid agen-
cies fund increasing amounts of GHG
mitigation and climate adaptation work
in developing countries.To what extent
are you engaged in this kind of work?
What are some notable projects, and
how are you expecting the market for
this kind of work to evolve over the next
two to five years?
ICF: This has been one of our fastest-
growing markets over the past five years,
and we expect this to continue growing as
developed countries make good on their
commitments to help developing coun-
tries realize their INDCs and improve
their resilience.
A couple of our flagship projects in
this area – which have great potential for
replication and scaling – include:
• Low Emissions Asian Development
(LEAD) Program for USAID, which
supports 11 developing countries in
Asia to accelerate sustainable, climate-
resilient economic growth while
slowing the growth of GHG emissions.
LEAD supports and enhances country-
led development programs, plans, and
policies, and complements efforts of
other international donors and or-
ganizations to support low-emission
development strategies (LEDS).
• China Emission Trading System Sup-
port for EuropeAid. ICF is leading
the International Technical Assistance
Team assisting China to design and
implement its emissions trading system.
As of Q4 2015, we had trained about
1,000 people including officials and
managers from central and local gov-
ernment departments and state-owned
enterprises. We’re helping to establish
China ETS communities of practice
for the existing pilot projects and the
eventual national system.
• Energy Efficiency for Clean Develop-
ment Program (EECDP) for USAID,
which promotes reductions in energy
use and associated greenhouse gas
(GHG) emissions through clean energy
and energy efficiency pilot projects.
CCBJ: What advice would you give to
small- and medium-sized firms that see
opportunity in this realm but haven’t
worked as contractors for USAID or
comparable entities?
ICF: Tough question. We work for
over a dozen US federal agencies on
climate and sustainability issues, and
USAID has by far the most complex and
challenging administrative requirements.
Moreover, the vast majority of USAID’s
projects are procured through their over-
seas missions, and many of them channel
work through IDIQs where the primes
are told that they are limited to only one
or two US-based subs, and instead must
use in-country subs and consultants to the
extent possible.This makes it very hard for
firms of any size to break in.
The most direct paths exist for small
businesses through set-asides for program
evaluation and those procurements that
include small business subcontracting
goals.
But in general, capture usually requires
extensive investments in travel and rela-
tionship building with potential clients
who are often reluctant to talk with con-
tractors. In short, this is a notoriously dif-
ficult market to penetrate for firms of any
size, and even though we’ve established a
couple of beachheads, we’re still finding it
a real challenge.
CCBJ: Regarding your GHG mitiga-
tion work in developing countries—of-
ten called low-emissions development
strategies or LEDS—what are some of
your notable recent projects? And how
do you think this business segment will
change and grow over the next few years,
especially in light of the Paris agree-
ment?
ICF: The LEAD project mentioned
above is our largest. We support several
others, including a five-year project for
USAID headquarters, “Resources to Ad-
vance LEDS Implementation,” or RALI
for shore.
Two key outcomes of this activity are
(a) to help all USAID program offices
measure the impact of GHG mitigation
investments, and (b) to identify and sup-
port activities in demand by the LEDS
community to help advance LEDS toward
implementation.
One of the key issues in COP21 was
transparency, i.e., how to do the mea-
surement, reporting, and verification of
activities within INDCs. Within LEAD,
RALI, and several other LEDS projects
we support for USAID and US EPA, we
have helped partner countries design sys-
tems to improve their GHG inventories.
This work has been cited by our partner
countries as helpful to designing their
![First Quarter 2016Volume X, No. 1-3
2015 Awards Show Steady
Growth of Climate Change as
Market Driver
Paris and Pope Francis change the
conversation
F
or the first time since the 2009-
2010 period, when Copenhagen
signaled the demise of the Kyoto
Protocol and U.S. senators John Kerry, Joe
Lieberman and Lindsey Graham gave up
their bipartisan drive to pass climate poli-
cy, the political tides seem to have shifted
decisively toward action and investment
for greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation
and climate change adaptation.
Yes, Paris is a voluntary agreement, and
its ultimate influence will depend “on the
weight given to it by political forces and
markets,” as Kyle Danish of DC law firm
Van Ness Feldman wrote after COP21
(bit.ly/1SsJx42). And yes, Congressional
Republicans hostile to climate policy
will likely control Congress for the next
few years—at least. With a Republican
president, we could see the United States
backing away from its Paris commitments,
which are based mostly on executive ac-
tions.
But such a move would risk an intense
international backlash, including possible
carbon taxes on U.S. exports. It would
also open a floodgate of lawsuits by the
same U.S. states, local governments and
NGOs that won the Supreme Court’s
agreement in 2007 that GHGs are air
pollutants to be regulated under the Clean
Air Act. In fact, Danish posits that the
next U.S. president will face “almost im-
mediate international pressure to increase
the ambition” of GHG-cutting measures
such as tighter standards for power plants,
vehicles and methane leaks in the oil and
gas sector.
Internationally, Paris will mean more
work for companies and NGOs that can
assist developing nations in taking low-
emission development strategies (LEDS)
and adaptating to climate change. In the
private sector, the main participants will
be large firms like Tetra Tech, CH2M,
Arup, AECOM and ICF and their sub-
contractors, as well as some mid-sized
firms with foreign offices.
Cheryl Karpowicz of Ecology and En-
vironment, a mid-sized firm with about
300 staff in Latin America, told CCBJ
that she expects Paris to lead to “new
opportunities” for her firm “to support
reducing emissions and building resilience
to climate change impacts … in devel-
oping countries.” (See full Q&A in this
edition.) Clients for this kind of work are
the aid agencies like USAID and GIZ,
multilateral funders such as the World
Bank, major foundations like Rockefeller
and even NGOs like WWF and Save the
Children.
While a great deal must be done in
rural farming regions—CCBJ award
recipients Oxfam America/World Food
Program have an exemplary business
model that combines insurance and physi-
cal adaptation—the priorities for action
out of Paris are the fast-growing cities of
the developing world.
According to Ingrid Gabriela Hoven,
director general, global issues, for the
German aid agency BMZ, directing
climate finance toward cities represents a
major shift for BMZ and other aid agen-
cies. “The thinking [in the past] has been
that if you provide more assistance to
urban areas, you might pull more people
from rural areas, undermining goals such
as combating hunger,” Hoven said at a
COP21 side event. She noted that only
about 10% of climate finance to date has
gone to cities, but said the trend is toward
urban initiatives.
2015 Executive Review & CCBJ Awards
2015 CCBJ Awards 3
Up to 20 staff working on climate change for Swiss Consulting Firm Ernst
Basler + Partner 10
With strong policy and business drivers, Ecology & Environment sees growing
markets for GHG mitigation, adaptation 13
American Security Project: Climate change figures in Middle East conflicts; for
adaptation at home, civilian and military leaders must cooperate 17
ICF: Climate change consultancy examines growth drivers and challenges 18
AECOM:Adaptation in early phase of long-term growth cycle 21
Choice and flexibility keys to winning consumer interest in energy efficiency, says
Research into Action President Jane Peters 24
Stantec sees growth ahead in North American resilience, adaptation work 26
Planet Labs: Faster, higher-rez imagery, automated image analysis are
ingredients for successful REDD+ recipe 28
Better analytics and forecasting of weather and demand will enable growth of
distributed PV, says Green Power Labs CEO Alexandre Pavlovski 30](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/efb9f10e-fc45-47e6-8acc-7a82a65d9e59-160602153840/85/dewberry-ccbj-q12016-1-320.jpg)
