During the recent heat wave in Washington D.C. there was a powerful set of thunderstorms that knocked down trees and they knocked down power lines leaving more than a million people without power. The Economist reports that the culprit are suburbanites who oppose tree pruning. The claim is that if the trees had a good haircut then there would be less risk of these trimmed down trees knocking down power lines. So, the greens face an interesting tradeoff. If the suburbs remain "green" and leafy then there is higher risk of low probability nasty power loss. How costly to the local aesthetics is the "tree pruning and trimming"?
Tree pruning is a simple example of climate change adaptation. Several of those who comment on the The Economist's piece are surprised that the local power company hasn't learned its lesson from previous storms. As we learn from the recent heat wave, electricity is valuable stuff for coping with extreme heat. We seek air conditioning and refrigeration and entertainment and electricity serves up all three. The role that electricity consumption plays in insulating us from extreme temperature risk is an under-studied subject. Environmentalists immediately jump to voicing concern that the power will be generated with fossil fuels and thus exacerbate climate change risk. Given our current mix of how we generate power (and our reliance on coal and natural gas), they are correct but as renewable's share of total generation increases this concern recedes.
