[MCN] Climate will "inevitably have an impact" on the economy

[Lance Olsen]

Insurance Journal   June 18, 2015

Insurers Stepping Toward Greater Green Investment Footprint
By Don Jergler |

http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2015/06/18/372341.htm

Excerpt:

More interesting was what Brader had to say next.

He was asked hypothetically how he and QBE would 
react if insurance regulators in that country 
someday began to direct insurers to steer their 
investments into more climate friendly financial 
products like green bonds.

"I have heard some of the rumblings, but I think 
that would be a logical place for policy to go 
and we would welcome that," Brader said. "We feel 
well-positioned to embrace that change and to 
support that change."

So far no regulators in Australia, nor the U.S. 
nor Europe, have stated intentions to require 
insurers to make such investments.

Such an idea may be hypothetical now, but there 
is mounting evidence that some non-green 
investments may be at greater risk - and there 
seems to be a greater interest in looking at 
those risks on insurers' books.

According to an updated report from global 
consulting firm Mercer, "Investing in a Time of 
Climate Change," under several global warming 
scenarios modelled, climate change will 
inevitably have an impact on investment returns.

http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2015/06/18/372341.htm
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Here, at the point of water uptake by the roots 
of plants, begins the problem with respect to 
water in the biosphere that makes all other water 
problems seem trifling."

Penman, H.L. The Water Cycle. Scientific American, September 1970

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  "Forest-driven evapotranspiration removed from a 
particular catchment contributes to the 
availability of atmospheric moisture vapor and 
its cross-continental transport, raising the 
likelihood of precipitation events and increasing 
water yield, in particular in continental 
interiors more distant from oceans. Š. 
Policy-making attempts  ...   must consider the 
linkage of forests to the supply of 
precipitation."

Global Change Biology (2012) 18, 806-820, doi: 
10.1111/j.1365-2486.2011.02589.x REVIEW
On the forest cover-water yield debate: from 
demand- to supply-side thinking. DAVID ELLISON, 
MARTYN N. FUTTER and KEVIN BISHOP
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Leonardo da Vinci's dictum, 'Water is the driver 
of nature,' is justified on meteorological 
grounds alone."

"Water vapor enters the atmosphere by evaporation 
(this term includes transpiration by vegetation), 
and the main oceanic sources are fairly 
identifiable. It leaves the atmosphere as rain or 
snow, and because the precipitation may take 
place close to the source or thousands of miles 
away, the residence time may vary from a few 
hours to a few weeksŠ.The general balance of 
evaporation and precipitation needs three sets of 
figures, one for the entire earth, one for the 
oceans and one for the land surface."

Penman, H.L. The Water Cycle. Scientific American, September 1970


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