In recent months insurance companies have rapidly abandoned the Adani Group’s Carmichael coal mine in Australia and the Trans Mountain tar sands oil pipeline in Canada when they were exposed by NGOs. The Trans Mountain pipeline, whose cover needs to be renewed by the end of August, has turned into a test case for insurers’ […]
Earlier this year, risk experts at the World Economic Forum identified the failure to address climate change as the most impactful – and sadly, the second-most likely – risk we face. It’s a risk the insurance industry must play its part in tackling. The sector itself may not emit a significant quantity of greenhouse gases. […]
Insurer Talanx has dropped support for Canada’s controversial Trans Mountain pipeline while Munich Re’s support is in doubt after it unveiled a new tar sands policy earlier this year, reveal emails to Canadian NGO Stand.earth. Subsidiaries of both companies were named on Trans Mountain’s current Certificate of Insurance, which lists 11 companies providing $508 million […]
The biggest future challenge the entire planet faces is climate change and the insurance industry is going to find itself on the frontline in the many coming battles to eliminate dependence on fossil fuels. As we escape from lockdown and the shadow of the pandemic recedes, the insurance sector is going to find reinvigorated and […]
Insurers must end all support for new oil and gas projects in order to meet international climate targets, NGOs supporting the Unfriend Coal / Insure Our Future campaign say in a letter to CEOs released today. They also released research revealing that four of the 15 biggest oil and gas insurers are companies that have […]
Documents leaked to the Sydney Morning Herald and seen by the Unfriend Coal campaign reveal that Liberty Mutual, HDI Global, XL Australia and Aspen Re are holding current policies for “early works project insurance” on the Adani Group’s Carmichael coal mine and rail network in Australia. The policies were brokered by Marsh. The proposed Carmichael coal […]
European insurers Lloyd’s, Zurich and Munich Re are the biggest supporters of Canada’s Trans Mountain pipeline, enabling a huge expansion of tar sands oil that would undermine international climate targets, the Unfriend Coal campaign reveals today. Trans Mountain is pressing ahead with plans to expand its pipeline connecting tar sands in Alberta to the Pacific […]
NGOs warn industry risks repeating mistakes made when it identified pandemic danger. Insurers must champion a green and fair recovery from the COVID-19 crisis because as professional risk managers they have a unique understanding of global threats, international NGOs supporting the Insure Our Future campaign say in a letter to industry associations released today. They […]
Keep up to date with the latest on coal, climate & insurance – Sign up to receive Insure Our Future News Alerts here. New York pension funds ask insurers to ditch coal On Friday 24th April, New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer on behalf of the city’s pension funds called on AIG, Berkshire Hathaway and Liberty […]
By Peter Bosshard In 2013, 3,000 insurance executives were polled to identify the most serious extreme risks facing the industry. By a large margin, they identified the world’s greatest threat as “a new, highly infectious and fatal” pandemic. In case you were wondering, an “invasion of non-peace-seeking aliens” was ranked lowest among 57 different risk […]
Keep up to date with the latest on coal, climate & insurance – Sign up to receive Insure Our Future News Alerts here. Will Marsh drop the Adani contract? For more than a year Marsh, the world’s largest insurance broker, has tried to arrange insurance cover for the Adani Group’s giant Carmichael coal mine project […]
AIG CEO Brian Duperreault clearly hasn’t gotten the memo. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has demonstrated that we cannot afford to build any new coal projects and need to phase out existing capacity quickly if we want to have a fighting chance of achieving the goals of the Paris Agreement. The UN Secretary General […]
The insurance industry’s shift away from coal, the biggest source of CO2 emissions, is accelerating. When we launched our 2019 coal insurance scorecard in early December, we were excited to see that since April 2017, 17 insurers had withdrawn from the coal sector. What used to be a European phenomenon had also ignited action among […]
46% of reinsurance market and 37% of industry’s global assets covered by coal exit policies The new 2019 report is available at http://insureourfuture.co/2019scorecard. The number of insurers withdrawing cover for coal has more than doubled in 2019 as the industry’s retreat from the sector accelerates and spreads beyond Europe, the Insure Our Future campaign reveals […]
Written by Foundation “Development YES – Open-Pit Mines NO Unfavourable trends in the global reinsurance market, risks related to climate change, and key reinsurance and insurance companies moving away from coal – these are the most important challenges for the power insurance market in 2019 according to experts from Willis Towers Watson. Apart from the unfavourable trends […]
Today, insurer AXIS Capital (NYSE: AXS) announced a new policy on fossil fuels to accelerate the transition to a low-carbon economy. In an unprecedented step for a U.S. insurer, AXIS Capital will restrict insurance for both coal and tar sands projects and companies. “We welcome AXIS Capital’s new policy as a major win for our […]
By Peter Bosshard, Coordinator, Insure Our Future campaign In a welcome move, Axis Capital and Canopius withdrew their bids for insuring the railway line of the Adani Group’s proposed Carmichael coal mine last week. This brings the number of insurers and financial institutions which have ruled out supporting the Adani project in some way to […]
By Lucie Pinson, European Coordinator of the Insure Our Future campaign The New York climate week opened this morning with the launch of a new asset owner climate alliance. The 12 signatories, among whom we can find the Insure Our Future targets Allianz, Swiss Re and Zurich, have committed to transitioning their investment portfolios to […]
By Lucie Pinson, European Coordinator of Insure Our Future To keep global warming to 1.5°C, we urgently need to phase out coal. The insurance industry, to its credit, is beginning to realize this and take action. Momentum is growing within the industry to adopt coal policies: Since 2015, 16 insurers have restricted investment and/or insurance […]
By Peter Bosshard, Coordinator of the Insure Our Future campaign The All Blacks are the world’s most successful rugby team and a symbol of New Zealand’s national pride. They are also the favorite with the bookies to win this year’s Rugby World Cup, which starts in Japan later this week. The All Blacks invited controversy […]