Given the heavy rain and 60-mile an hour winds that descended on Hawaii this past week, a recently issued report on climate change by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development seems particularly timely.
The study seeks to help policy makers determine where to focus adaptation strategies to climate extremes and to understand the benefits of taking immediate action. The report recommends insurers, who end up paying a large part of the bill from any damage caused by climate change, encourage policyholders to adopt methods to avoid harm from global warming.
The report finds the impact of climate change and urban development could more than triple the number of people in the world exposed to coastal flooding by 2070. One hundred fifty million people could be exposed to a 1 in 100 year coastal flood event by 2070, up from 40 million today. The estimated financial impact of such an event would rise from $3 trillion today to $35 trillion by 2070.
Half the world's population is exposed to coastal flowing. The cities with the highest value of property and infrastructure assets exposed to coastal flooding are primarily in developed countries. Miami is the most exposed city today, with exposed assets from $400 billion today to over $3.5 trillion in 2070.
A copy of the report is at http://www.oecd.org/home/
