Addressing the Climate–Innovation Conundrum: Balancing Adaptation and Mitigation in Climate-Exposed Industries

As economies must decarbonise by 2050, international accords growing rely on firms’ capacity to innovate for both mitigation (reducing emissions) and adaptation (coping with inevitable impacts). Yet these two strategies, generally treated as complementary, can undermine each other: effective, technology-led adaptation to nature’s shifts can dull the pressure to decarbonise, creating a “climate–innovation conundrum” that fuels long-term risk. As in alpine tourism, where artificial snow has become the main way of surviving, adaptation technologies can offset short-term losses but lock industries and communities into unsustainable and unexplored spirals. Management research is increasingly seen as vital to this debate. With AMT, I will investigate when and why climate innovation can backfire on resilience. AMT will: (1) map how a climate-exposed industry navigates adaptation–mitigation trade-offs and the cognitive dynamics driving entrenchment; (2) theorize the consequences of such entrenchment by identifying lock-ins and developing the construct of climate-exposed expiring industries—profitable yet physically unsustainable sectors; and (3) co-produce an actionable toolkit with stakeholders to guide transition. Empirically, I will study the snow-dependent winter-sports industry in the south-facing Dolomites—already >3 °C warmer than pre-industrial levels—an early-warning laboratory where adaptation technologies matured early. With Italy now a leader in snowmaking innovation—and 90% of its slopes already reliant on artificial snow—the setting offers a compelling preview of the trade-offs other sectors are likely to face globally. Hosted at Oxford Saïd (Prof. Juliane Reinecke) with a secondment at King’s Business School (Prof. Paolo Aversa), the fellowship will provide me advanced methods and a cross-sector network. It will advance my path towards EU leadership in sustainable business research and deliver actionable insights for the EU Green Deal and a just transition.