Forest fire insurance costs soar at Munich Re

Forest fires are becoming increasingly likely because of climate change and are bound to cost insurers more than ever, with the deadly fire that ravaged northern California the single most expensive natural disaster in 2018, German reinsurer Munich Re said, reports Alexander Huebner for Reuters. Ernst Rauch, the reinsurer’s chief climatologist, told the newswire that forest fires were entering a whole new dimension, costing tens of billions of dollars. “Higher and higher temperatures are leading to ever greater droughts, and high humidity in the winter means that shrubbery grows quickly, creating an easily flammable material in dry summers,” he said.