Virginians in coastal counties are finding it increasingly difficult and expensive to get homeowners' insurance as large insurers bail out due to concerns about more frequent and powerful hurricanes. Despite a tepid tropical season in '06, insurers looking down the road aren't taking any chances--they're moving aggressively to limit their risks.
[Coverage is still available, albeit at a steep price, from smaller carriers. No doubt such carriers can earn large profits over the short term by charging premium rates to coastal homeowners. We wonder how many of those insurers will be around to pay claims if a major hurricane strikes the coast.]
Like it or not, Virginia's coastal counties and their residents, which contain a huge percentage of Virginia's population, are at the greatest risk of the negative effects of global warming, including more frequent storms and a general increase in ocean sea levels. The growing insurance crisis should serve as a wake-up call to citizens of those counties.
With their large stake in the global-warming crisis, Virginia's coastal residents can and should take the lead in moving the state toward a leadership role in reducing CO2 emissions and investing in alternative energy options.
One place to look for a very modest beginning is the non-coastal county of Arlington. New County Board Chairman Paul Ferguson kicked off the new year by announcing a series of quite modest policy initiatives to make Arlington greener and reduce its carbon contribution. These include increasing the amount of wind power the county purchases from 3 percent to 5 percent, offering a tax break on hybrid cars, handing out compact-flourescent light bulbs to citizens and outfitting county buildings with solar panels.
[One thing missing from Arlington's green agenda is exempting homeowner installed alternative energy sources from property tax valuations. C'mon, Paul, this is an easy one!]
We'd like to see a more aggressive effort. For example, most of Arlington's schools could be outfitted with solar panels and some might even be suited to wind turbines, all of which could be used as teaching tools. However, we'll take it one step at a time. Further, such initiatives could be greatly improved by much-needed statewide legislation to make alternative fuel sources more competitive economically.
Virginia's coastal counties should similarly initiate programs to reduce their carbon output, as they are the ones who will suffer disproportionately from global warming. Perhaps those homeowners watching their insurance premiums rise faster than sea levels will get--and send--the right message.
3 comments:
XCurmudgeon, thanks for the kind words about Chairman Ferguson's climate initative. Some of us share your enthusiasm for a more aggressive approach, but understand this is a brand new initiative and we want to walk in a coordinated manner before we try to run. And if we exceed some of the stated goals in 2007, that just adds to the momentum, right?
About the solar exemption from real estate assessments you're looking for: that is a false "incentive" since Arlington (and probably most other jurisdictions) do not include mechanical and electrical devices like solar in property assessments anyway. Your assessment is simply based on your land and the fundamental condition of your building(s) on it. Your assessment won't rise because of the solar, so the exemption wouldn't change your assessment. Oh, maybe Arlington will someday join the other jurisdictions that have provided the 'exemption', but we'd rather focus on getting real results than making empty gestures.
Stay tuned!
By the way, we're looking for a few case studies to help spread success stories and the spirit of "we can do it." If you've been reducing your own carbon footprint (message especially to readers in Arlington) and are willing to share your story and quantitative data, drop a note to us at, climate(at)arlingtonva.us
Thanks for the useful information County Staffer. We look forward to seeing how the current initiative fares, and of course hope that, incrementally, we'll add to them.
We'll drop you a note shortly with how our carbon footprint reduction efforts are going (and we'll be posting on the Curmudgeon in another few weeks when we have some better data on the output from our solar panels and the conservation reductions from replacing regular light bulbs with compact fluorescent lamps).
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