http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123733370641063551.html * MARCH 18, 2009
Insurers Must Disclose Climate-Change Exposure
By JEFFREY BALL
Insurance companies must start disclosing how climate change is likely to affect their businesses, state insurance regulators decided Tuesday.
The National Association of Insurance Commissioners voted to require insurers to submit annual "climate-risk" reports, an unusually aggressive stance on the environmental issue from industry regulators.
The officials acted after concluding that climate change threatens insurers in two ways. It increases the risk of extreme weather events such as floods and wildfires, which would boost claims. And it is prompting governments to cap industrial carbon emissions that contribute to global warming -- a move threatens the profits of companies such as coal-fired utilities in which insurers commonly invest.
Climate change "will have a huge impact on the insurance industry," particularly on property and casualty insurers, said Joel Ario, Pennsylvania's insurance commissioner and the head of the association's global-warming task force.
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