Insurers accelerated the shift away from coal, new study finds

Fossil fuel exclusions are effective but Lloyd’s and Zurich play questionable roles. Insurance companies which adopted coal restrictions significantly reduced the number of coal mines and the amount of coal which they insured in the United States, thus contributing to the shift away from coal. This is the main finding of a new working paper which …

The 2025 Insurance AGM Season: Continued Inaction on Climate

Many insurance companies across Europe and North America just wrapped up their annual shareholder meetings. Insure Our Future network organisations recently attended to assess how insurers are approaching climate risk and fossil fuels, as the climate crisis intensifies and threatens to undermine the insurance industry itself. What they witnessed was a bleak picture of continued …

18 global insurers and 10 banks have excluded the Alaska LNG from their support

18 global insurers and 10 banks have excluded the Alaska LNG from their support – Environmental NGOs urged Tokio Marine to comply its policy at the annual general meeting – Japan Center for a Sustainable Environment and Society (JACSES) Friends of the Earth Japan Mekong Watch Rainforest Action Network (RAN) Oil Change International First published …

Insurers’ exclusion policies contribute to mine closures, study finds

A new academic study by researchers at the University of Zurich and the Swiss Finance Institute provides the first systematic evidence on the effects of insurers’ carbon underwriting policies. The study finds that when major insurers wield their underwriting power to manage climate risks, this can have real consequences for the coal industry. Using data …

Open letter to new Lloyd’s of London CEO Patrick Tiernan calling for climate leadership

London, June 2 2025 – Reclaim Finance has published an open letter addressed to Patrick Tiernan, who begins his tenure as CEO of Lloyd’s of London on June 1st. The open letter calls on him to show real leadership on climate change in the face of spiralling climate risks, in particular by taking the first …

Insurers must manage climate risk, not worsen it

Insurers are not just takers of risk, they’re makers of risk. That’s the message I left the audience at a Financial Times industry panel event last week, joined by insurance leaders from Howden, Munich Re, and Risilience.  The panel sought to understand the impacts of the so-called insurability crisis, that is the withdrawal of major …

Tallgrass Institute report: Free, Prior and Informed Consent Due Diligence for Insurers

Tallgrass Institute Publishes FPIC Due Diligence Guide for Insurers

Within the insurance industry, there are multiple touchpoints with Indigenous Peoples. Insurance companies with policies that respect Indigenous Peoples’ right to self-determination and to free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) may find more opportunity to partner in an expanding marketplace. There is also a growing recognition among insurance providers of the risks associated with failing …

Beautiful Architecture building cityscape with tower in Seoul city South Korea

Insured for profit, not for protection? Korean insurers face scrutiny over fossil fuel investments and disaster coverage

Seoul, April 29 2025 – Originally posted by Solutions For Our Climate here – Consumers Korea, with the help of Solutions for Our Climate (SFOC), is calling on regulators to examine the role of insurance companies in both worsening the climate crisis and denying compensation for its consequences. On April 29, Consumers Korea submitted a …

Strong shareholder vote sends Fairfax a clear message on climate risk

The Fairfax AGM was last week where our proposal asking the company to disclose its financed emissions was voted on. The company has now released the voting results, unfortunately not breaking out the numbers by shares controlled by the CEO vs. those voted by other shareholders, but we can calculate those numbers based on turnout. The result: a …

Climate change: senior insurance leader warns of economic collapse

Zurich, 31 March 2025 – Why are all his peers remaining silent? Managing the risks of natural disasters, insurers are well aware of the fundamental risks which climate change poses to the global financial system and society. Munich Re first predicted growing climate risks in 1973, and the then CEO of AXA famously warned in …

Swiss insurance companies under the climate microscope

Zurich, 27 March 2025 – New report from Campax reveals none of Switzerland’s eight largest property and liability insurers have climate policies that are compatible with the goals of the Paris Agreement. This in-depth look at the Swiss insurance landscape suggests smaller regional companies tend to perform less well than international heavyweights. Generali leads the …

Insurance gap in the age of climate crisis: New report spotlights Vienna Insurance Group’s alarming lack of effective climate policies

Prague, 11 March 2025 – As the impacts of climate crisis intensify, the role of the insurance business in either mitigating or deepening the crisis cannot be ignored. A new report The Insurance Gap in the Age of Climate Crisis: Ranking the Major Insurers in Central and Eastern Europe by the Czech NGO Re-set focuses …

Why people in nearly 30 countries are protesting at insurance companies

In the last week of February, people in over 30 countries across the world organized demonstrations, marches, and community events at some of the largest global insurance companies – including AIG, Tokio Marine, Zurich, Chubb, Lloyd’s of London, Travelers, Sompo, and The Hartford. These events brought a clear message: Insure our future, not fossil fuels. …

Insurance companies can’t hide anymore: communities from across the globe demand action

The Insure Our Future network and communities from across the world are coming together for the first ever Global Week of Action to spotlight and target the insurance industry for their role in the climate crisis and demand action. Groups in over 27 countries across 5 continents are holding a week’s worth of demonstrations, marches, …

A shot of natural gas storage tanks in sphere shape in Okayama, Japan

MS&AD Announce Significant Emission Reduction Target

Tokyo, 22 November 2023 – On November 21, MS&AD Insurance Group Holdings (hereafter MS&AD), one of Japan’s three major property and casualty insurers, announced a greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction target of 37%  for the underwriting and investment portfolio of its domestic clients by 2030, using 2019 as a baseline year* (PR in Japanese). This …

Campaigners call on the International Association of Insurance Supervisors to take action on climate

Activists gathered in front of the International Association of Insurance Supervisors (IAIS) annual conference venue in Tokyo, Japan, on the 9th of November, asking the global standard-setting body to take decisive measures and strengthen their efforts to prevent the worsening of the global climate crisis. 📣Outside the @IAISNews annual conference last week attended by over …

Allianz’s transition plan: bold but with serious loopholes

On September 7, 2023, leading global insurance company Allianz published its first Net Zero Transition Plan.  Peter Bosshard, Global Network Coordinator of the Insure Our Future campaign commented: Allianz’s transition plan is transparent, comprehensive, timely and in many ways ambitious but contains serious gaps when it comes to new gas infrastructure. If Allianz closes these loopholes, its transition …

Lloyd's of London Building

Lloyd’s ESG update: A step towards forgotten commitments, or more greenwashing?

London, 5 September 2023, first published in The Insurer – Lloyd’s of London, one of the world’s largest insurers of fossil fuels, has said it will comment more expansively on ESG guidance in September 2023. It is anticipated to be a further distancing from Lloyd’s first ESG policy, published in December 2020, and another textbook …

Lloyd’s of London Insurer Probitas Exits Controversial Adani Coal Mine

This week, facing mounting pressure from campaigners, Lloyd’s of London syndicate, Probitas1492, ruled out providing insurance for Adani’s Carmichael coal mine and its related infrastructure.  Probitas was known to insure the mine’s transport system, but also admitted that the mine itself had been insured through the Lloyd’s of London marketplace. Ash Bathia, Chief Executive Officer …

Activists demand Tokio Marine rule out EACOP at annual shareholder meeting

On 26 June 2023, citizens and environmental NGOs gathered in front of the AGM venue of Tokio Marine Holdings; Japan’s biggest and one of the world’s top 10 oil and gas insurers.  #StopEACOP activists question Tokio Marine’s ethics  Risa Iizuka, a youth activist and Field Organizer at 350.org Japan, condemned the 1,400km-long  East African Crude …

Mother's Rise Up Mary Poppins themed protest

Why mothers are taking on the insurance industry

The insurance sector is the Achilles’ heel of the fossil fuel industry  Without insurance, fossil fuel companies cannot operate and fossil fuel projects cannot be built or maintained.   This is why we, at Mothers Rise Up, a UK climate-parent group, focus our creative energy on the insurance sector, particularly on the world’s oldest, biggest and …

A hurricane due to climate change

In response to climate deniers, insurers must step up climate action

Written in collaboration with Reclaim Finance. Numerous insurers have quit the Net Zero Insurance Alliance (NZIA) under pressure from climate denying politicians and officials in the United States. The insurance industry has for decades been aware of the causes and serious consequences of climate change and its business model is being shaken by repeated multi-billion …

Insure Our Future’s response to the Net Zero Insurance Alliance exodus

What’s happening with the Net Zero Insurance Alliance  Today, French reinsurer SCOR, the world’s 7th biggest non-life reinsurance company left the Net Zero Insurance Alliance (NZIA) while significantly strengthening its oil and gas restrictions at the same time. At its AGM, the reinsurer today announced that it would no longer underwrite the development of new …

Insurers’ shift away from fossil fuels continues in spite of political obstruction

This article first appeared on Environmental Finance. You can find the article here. The recent departures of Munich Re, Zurich and Hannover Re from the Net Zero Insurance Alliance (NZIA) have created a lot of debate. Amidst all the noise it’s important to remember the following basic facts about net zero commitments. Munich Re has cited antitrust concerns as the reason …

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