Lawsuits accuse insurers of colluding to drop coverage in fire-prone parts of California

Lessons learned from California's wildfires

iStock.com/Wirestock Facing increased wildfire risk, Canada’s property and casualty insurers are calling for urgent measures to avoid the type of home insurance availability and affordability crisis now seen in California. “Canada’s property and casualty (P&C) insurance industry has been raising the issue of wildfire risk in the country for years, and it is imperative that policymakers acknowledge the factors that led to the insurance crisis in …

Lawsuits allege that insurers colluded to limit wildfire coverage and shift costs to state plan

Two lawsuits allege that major insurance companies coordinated to drop coverage in wildfire-prone California areas, pushing homeowners onto a costly, state-backed insurance plan.Trân Nguyễn reports for The Associated Press.In short:A group of homeowners filed a lawsuit claiming insurers like State Farm conspired to stop issuing policies in high-risk wildfire zones, including areas devastated by Los Angeles-area fires in January.The FAIR Plan, a …

California moves to create public wildfire algorithm to ease insurance crisis

Fire and insurance experts convened on Tuesday to help California take a step toward solving its insurance issues with big data.

Compounding effects of climate change and WUI expansion quadruple the likelihood of extreme-impact wildfires in California

Previous research has examined individual factors contributing to wildfire risk, but the compounding effects of these factors remain underexplored. Here, we introduce the “Integrated Human-centric Wildfire Risk Index (IHWRI)” to quantify the compounding effects of fire-weather intensification and anthropogenic factors—including ignitions and human settlement into wildland—on wildfire risk. While climatic trends increased the frequency of high-ri…

Insurers slashing health plan benefits at same time as they push through huge premium hikes

Insurers are slashing the benefits on health plans at the same time as they push through huge premium hikes. A leading health cover expert said all four health insurers are now engaged in this “shrinkflation”.

Rebuilding requires reimagining environmentalism

As Los Angeles struggles to rebuild following January’s devastating wildfires, one thing is clear: Our broken policies didn’t just fail to prevent this disaster—they’re making it harder to rebuild. Decades of misguided regulations have restricted the housing supply and inflated building costs, leaving communities struggling to recover. Helping fire victims rebuild quickly has prompted efforts to speed permits and insurance claims. But this disas…