The Financial Post reports in its Tuesday edition that work on climate change has largely focused on preventing it from getting worse, but as a new Royal Bank of Canada study points out, businesses are also starting to think more about potential spending on adaptation and preparation as the costs of disasters pile up. A Canadian Press dispatch to the Post quotes the report saying that extreme weather and natural disaster costs totalled $368-billion (U.S.) last year, 14 per cent above the long-term average since 2000, and that this year could match or exceed the total. The trend is expected to get worse because, as the report notes, there is expected to be a 2.7 C rise in average temperatures by 2100 based on current global policies and actions, while an optimistic scenario pegs the rise at 1.9 C. The costs stemming from rising temperatures are leading to more attention in boardrooms. The report says that so far it is still a challenge to finance bigger, longer-term adaptation efforts, but that a study out this year found that every $1 invested in adaptation and resilience generates more than $10 in benefits over a decade. (In a study released last week, RBC was ranked as the eighth biggest oil-and-gas backer globally.)