Diverse forms of infrastructure, including systems for water and sanitation, transport, buildings, energy, food, telecommunications, resource use, and waste management underpin the global economy as well as human well-being. At the same time, infrastructure assets are a major source of anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Hence, sustainable and resilient infrastructure (SDG 9) is a core component of all pathways towards a low-carbon economy, and unleashing the potential of purposefully designed infrastructure assets is essential to spur multilevel climate action (SDG 13).
Because of the long lifespan of infrastructure assets, the impacts of the infrastructure choices that are made today will have climate impacts – either positive or negative – that will last for generations. Against this backdrop, this policy brief, The Infrastructure And Climate Change Nexus: Integrated approaches as a catalyst for transformational change, calls attention to the need for governance mechanisms that support multi-disciplinary cooperation and coordination across various policy levels (sub-national, national, regional, international) in order to ensure that infrastructure is delivering the right services in an inclusive manner.