Mortality Impacts of Temperature Extremes: Insights from Climate Model Projections and MIMOSA Model Integration

Abstract

Temperature extremes have a significant impact on mortality, yet most Integrated Assessment Models (IAMs) fail to account for them. Recently, age-dependent mortality-temperature response functions were developed to address this gap. This thesis work uses these response functions and CMIP6 temperature data to project future mortality under climate change scenarios and incorporate the results into the MIMOSA model. The results indicate that South Asia, the Middle East, and Northern Africa will experience the highest increase in mortality, rendering them the most vulnerable regions. Canada and Europe will experience fewer cold-related deaths but their aging populations will still lead to a rise in overall mortality. Additionally, ignoring the role of day-to-day temperature variability in the assessment can underestimate mortality by 10%, and ignoring seasonal variability underestimates it by 12%. Finally, a cost-benefit analysis in MIMOSA shows that if mortality is taken into account, limiting future GMST increases by the end of the century would require an additional 7% reduction to compensate for mortality damages. This study highlights the importance of including the health impacts of climate extremes in IAMs and represents an initial effort to integrate the damages caused by climate extremes in these types of models.