Maps Reveal Nationwide Impacts of Climate-Driven Insurance Crisis
WASHINGTON, D.C. — As increasingly frequent severe storms, fires, hurricanes, and floods triggered by the climate crisis have ripped across the United States, a series of interactive maps and tables released today by Public Citizen and the Revolving Door Project underscore the widespread impacts of skyrocketing home insurance premiums, insurance policy nonrenewals, and cancellations across the country.
The maps reflect data released in recent months by the U.S. Treasury’s Federal Insurance Office and the U.S. Senate Committee on the Budget’s investigation into the impact of climate change on insurance markets. The maps and tables reveal ZIP code- and county-level changes across multiple metrics over time, allowing for closer geographic analysis than was previously possible. The underlying data existed before mostly in spreadsheets or static maps. Public Citizen and the Revolving Door Project transformed the data into useful tools with enhanced interactivity.
“This data is a first step toward monitoring the crisis, identifying vulnerable communities, and informing urgent policy interventions,” said Carly Fabian, senior insurance policy advocate, Public Citizen’s Climate Program. “Monitoring the availability and affordability of insurance is essential because it is primarily policyholders and the public who are paying the price for climate change through higher premiums, while insurance companies are continuing to profit. This data should be a starting point for ongoing work to understand how climate change is impacting policyholders across the country. As the crisis deepens, greater public access to data like this will tell a deeper story about how the crisis is impacting us all.”
There is a long-term trend toward insurance companies restricting coverage, and the one-year term of property insurance contracts creates a unique financial vulnerability for households and communities. With the power to renew and reprice annually, insurance companies can collect premiums for decades and then simply walk away.
“These maps and tables bring to life data that sheds light on the worsening home insurance crisis, one of the clearest economic manifestations of fossil fuel-driven climate chaos,” said Revolving Door Project senior researcher Kenny Stancil. “Ideally, these interactive tools will help people make sense of what’s happening, and aid advocates and policymakers who are pursuing solutions. Our hope is for this resource to be generative—to prompt further questions, research and analysis, on-the-ground organizing, local op-eds, and investigative journalism.”
Most of the maps and tables released today by Public Citizen and Revolving Door Project rely on the trove of data released earlier this year by the Treasury Department. The data revealed that homeowners insurance is becoming more costly and harder to procure for millions of Americans. Public Citizen had called on FIO to release the data in December, citing the office’s mandate to monitor insurance across the country for systemic risks and impacts on marginalized communities.
In a March letter to Congress sent not long after the data was released, the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) called for the elimination of the Federal Insurance Office.
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