Climate Change: 'Adapt or bust'

Seattle Post
Editorial
June 17, 2006

Forget tree-huggers, hair-shirted doomsayers and even retread presidential candidates. The planet's most conservative, risk-averse businesspeople now recognize the reality of global climate change.

The insurance industry, which has to pay up if the consensus of scientists is correct, has quite literally bought into the scenario.

Thursday in Seattle, State Insurance Commissioner Mike Kreidler hosted what he called a "climate change summit" to engage insurers, public officials and science.

For the insurance industry, changing weather patterns, rising sea levels and increased seismic activity threaten to both increase claims and diminish its investment assets.

Lloyd's of London, the oldest insurance market in the world, released a report this month on the threat the industry faces. "Climate Change: Adapt or Bust," warns, "If we do not take action now to understand the risks and their impact, the changing climate could kill us." While the report "focuses on adaptation ... we recognize that mitigation of the risk itself (i.e., the reduction of CO{-2} emissions) is crucial."

Marsh, the world's leading risk and insurance services firm, released a report in April in which it called climate change "one of the most significant emerging risks facing the world today."

Last month, American International Group adopted a policy that "recognizes the scientific consensus that climate change is a reality and is likely in large part the result of human activities that have led to increased concentrations of greenhouse gases in the Earth's atmosphere."

The remaining climate-change doubters might consider sharing space with the Flat Earth Society.