Hawaii State Senator: Did Your Home Insurance Bill Increase? Big Oil Should Pay Up

Newsweek

4 days ago

Imagine getting a letter from your home insurance company explaining that your annual bill was going to be 10 times higher this year, even though you'd never made a claim for damages to your home.
Thousands of American homeowners—including many in my home state of Hawaii—don't need to imagine. Last year, insurers in our state drastically raised rates to reflect the increasing threat of extreme weather disasters and to recoup money they had to pay out after the deadly 2023 Maui wildfires.
But why should everyday people be asked to shoulder these costs, while an industry that actively made the problem worse pays nothing? Giant fossil fuel corporations predicted decades ago that the unchecked burning of their products could lead to out of control weather disasters, creating chaos in insurance markets. Don't they bear some of the responsibility for making this nightmare a reality?
Debris removal at a former apartment building in the Lahaina wildfire impact zone on August 2, 2024, in Lahaina, Hawaii.
Debris removal at a former apartment building in the Lahaina wildfire impact zone on August 2, 2024, in Lahaina, Hawaii.Insurers shouldn't push the costs of climate change on to their policyholders while letting the companies causing it off the hook. That's why Hawaii is pursuing a fairer model that other states can emulate: make the fossil fuel industry help pick up the tab. Our state recently passed a first of its kind resolution encouraging insurance companies to take Big Oil to court for climate damages before raising rates on their customers.
Simply put: fossil fuel-driven climate change is creating a nationwide cost-of-living crisis, especially when it comes to housing. Supercharged wildfires in Los Angeles and Maui and unprecedented flooding in the Carolinas from Hurricane Helene have displaced thousands of Americans. When they do get a check from their insurance company, many find that it only covers a fraction of the cost of rebuilding their homes.
Faced with mounting claims, insurance companies are pulling out of entire communities, canceling existing policies, and refusing to issue new policies. Given that insurance is generally required on new mortgages, uninsurable homes are essentially unsellable homes. Mortgage lenders in wildfire-stricken Colorado communities are reporting a rash of home sales falling apart because buyers can't secure insurance.
Experts warn that this growing crisis threatens to infect the broader economy. In a recent Senate hearing, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) warned of an "economic cascade" of consequences for real estate markets, and cited a Freddie Mac chief economist predicting that if left unchecked, the insurance crisis could cause "a 2008-style economic recession."
We're on track for economic disaster, while fossil fuel industry giants who put us in this position keep raking in billions of dollars in profits. Rather than pulling the rug out from under hardworking families and abandoning entire communities, insurance companies should make the fossil fuel industry pay their fair share of the costs.
While they may not seem like the most likely group to hold the fossil fuel industry accountable, insurance companies are already well-practiced in taking bad actors to court for their role in extreme weather disasters. When utilities' unmaintained power lines ignited devastating wildfires in California in 2017 and 2018, insurers successfully forced them to pay up, temporarily reducing the severity of rate increases on homeowners and slowing the trend of insurance companies fleeing the state.
Just like the companies who sparked a blaze, the fossil fuel industry bears responsibility for contributing to the soaring high temperatures and drier atmosphere that turn a routine forest fire into a blazing inferno. Researchers who measure climate change's contribution to extreme weather disasters estimate that companies like Chevron and ExxonMobil are each responsible for nearly $2 trillion in economic losses from extreme heat between 1991 and 2020.
This isn't a surprise to Big Oil—internal documents show their researchers warning as far back as the 1970s that their products would warm the global climate and fuel "potentially catastrophic events." Industry executives were convinced enough to invest in making their own oil wells and pipelines resilient to climate change, while also working for decades to mislead the public about their products' connection to the problem. That deception continues today, with oil and gas majors proudly advertising their commitment to clean energy while they ramp up the production and burning of fossil fuels.
Since 2002, climate change has cost the insurance industry an estimated $600 billion in insured losses, costs that were likely recouped from consumers through higher premiums. The oil and gas industry, which has averaged nearly $3 billion in profit per day, could have covered those losses without breaking a sweat.
As policymakers nationwide grapple with a growing insurance crisis, our first priority should be to protect consumers from extreme rate hikes and stabilize markets for insurers. When you make a mess, you clean up after yourself. It's time for the fossil fuel industry to do the same.
Chris Lee serves as president of the National Caucus of Environmental Legislators, a bi-partisan organization of 1,500 state legislators from all 50 states. He has served in the Hawaii State Legislature since 2008, where he authored the nation's first state laws transitioning utilities to 100 percent renewable energy, directing economy-wide carbon neutrality, and targeting zero-emissions transportation.
The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.