Wildfires raging in the West, exacerbated by drought; heavy rains in the Midwest, Northeast, and South; deadly heat waves in the Pacific Northwest; hurricanes wreaking havoc from the Gulf Coast to New England: Many Americans found it impossible to ignore the extreme weather caused by climate change in 2021. According to a Washington Post analysis,… Continue reading Extreme Weather Fueled by Climate Change Hit 4 in 10 Americans Where They Lived in 2021
Tag: wildfires
Communities Far from Flammable Forests Increasingly at Risk As Embers Flung for Miles in CO Wildfire
Boulder County Commissioner Matt Jones was driving back from photographing a winter wildfire six miles from his home when his wife called to say they were being evacuated due to the same blaze. “This can’t be happening,” Mr. Jones, who had spent years fighting wildfires, recalled thinking. “Wildfires do not strike Louisville, Colorado.” The 6,067-acre… Continue reading Communities Far from Flammable Forests Increasingly at Risk As Embers Flung for Miles in CO Wildfire
Climate Change Turns Up the Heat on Carriers and Insureds
Tony and Jhan Dunn never thought they would leave California, where they grew up, built a life together and planned to retire. But after a wildfire swept through their Northern California town of Paradise three years ago, burning their home to the ground, they could not get insurance to buy another. “We basically got priced… Continue reading Climate Change Turns Up the Heat on Carriers and Insureds
Biden Launches Plan to Address ‘Silent Killer’: Extreme Heat
The Biden administration is moving to protect workers and communities from extreme heat after a dangerously hot summer that spurred an onslaught of drought-worsened wildfires and caused hundreds of deaths from the Pacific Northwest to hurricane-ravaged Louisiana. Under a plan announced Monday, the departments of Labor, Health and Human Services and other federal agencies are… Continue reading Biden Launches Plan to Address ‘Silent Killer’: Extreme Heat
Overlapping Disasters Expose Harsh Climate Reality: The U.S. Is Not Ready
In Louisiana and Mississippi, nearly one million people lack electricity and drinking water after a hurricane obliterated power lines. In California, wildfire menaces Lake Tahoe, forcing tens of thousands to flee. In Tennessee, flash floods killed at least 20; hundreds more perished in a heat wave in the Northwest. And in New York City, 7… Continue reading Overlapping Disasters Expose Harsh Climate Reality: The U.S. Is Not Ready
Wildfire-Predicting Startup Kettle Tries to Help Insurers Cope with Climate Change
Climate change is making California’s fire seasons more severe, but the conditions that lead to any single fire remain consistent: dry weather, overgrown brush, wind speed, and wind direction. Private companies and public agencies are racing to develop technology to monitor these conditions, in the hopes of understanding how wildfires spread—and predicting them before they… Continue reading Wildfire-Predicting Startup Kettle Tries to Help Insurers Cope with Climate Change
UN Climate Report’s Warnings Compound Worries in Insurance World
A UN climate change report’s warnings are compounding alarm in the insurance industry and companies that pay premiums, as they eye increased risks from more frequent and more severe storms, wildfires, droughts, and rising sea levels threatening coastal cities. The Intergovermental Panel on Climate Change report—which United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres branded a “code… Continue reading UN Climate Report’s Warnings Compound Worries in Insurance World
Severe Weather Events Drive Global Insured Catastrophe Losses of $42B in H1 2021: Swiss Re
A deep winter freeze, hailstorms and wildfires contributed to natural catastrophe losses of $40 billion in the first half of 2021, according to Swiss Re Institute’s preliminary sigma estimates.[1] This is above the previous ten-year average of $33 billion and the second highest on record for a first half after 2011, when major earthquakes in… Continue reading Severe Weather Events Drive Global Insured Catastrophe Losses of $42B in H1 2021: Swiss Re
U.N. Panel Report: Some Climate-Change Effects May Be Irreversible
Rising seas, melting ice caps and other effects of a warming climate may be irreversible for centuries and are “unequivocally” driven by greenhouse-gas emissions from human activity, a scientific panel working under the auspices of the United Nations said Monday in a new report. Issued by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, an organization of… Continue reading U.N. Panel Report: Some Climate-Change Effects May Be Irreversible
Insurers Won’t Save a Heating World from Floods and Fire: Bloomberg Opinion
There’s bad news for those looking for comfort in the face of flooding that’s inundated cities in China, Germany and India and wildfires that have consumed suburbs in California, Canada, and Australia: The insurance industry isn’t planning on hanging around to bail you out. An insurance rescue mission is such a routine aspect of natural… Continue reading Insurers Won’t Save a Heating World from Floods and Fire: Bloomberg Opinion