ABSTRACT
Global environmental and socio-economic risks associated with the magnitude of climate change projected for the end of the century have been outlined in various reports (IPCC 2007; Stern 2006; Global Humanitarian Forum 2009) and are the focus of international policy negotiations including the Conference of Parties (COP) in Copenhagen in December 2009 (COP-15), and COP-16 in Cancun, Mexico, in December 2010. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (2007) concluded with very high confidence that climate change beyond certain threshold levels will impede the ability of many nations to make progress on sustainable development and become a growing security risk. The Stern Review (Stern 2006) concluded that the costs of reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions now would be much smaller than the costs of economic disruption resulting from inaction, a view now apparently shared by many business organisations (Ernst and Young 2010; PricewaterhouseCoopers 2010; UN Global Compact 2010; WEF 2009).
