TalkClimateChange

As we mentioned in our piece on climate extremism and on the rights and wrongs of the climate change argument, there are those who do no favours to their point of view through biased reporting of the facts.

A recent post on DeSmogBlog is a great example of this:

Weather-Related Insurance Losses Doubled in ‘07

Losses to insurers from natural disasters nearly doubled this year to just below $30 billion globally after an unusually quiet 2006, a leading reinsurer said, from winter storms in Europe, flooding in Britain and wildfires in the U.S.

Munich Re also warned that climate change could mean a growing number of weather-related catastrophes in coming years.

A closer look at the figures show that insurance losses in 2007, although 50% higher than 2006, were only 40% of total losses in 2005. Meaning that the insurance industry actually had a pretty good year.

Looking further at the history of insurance losses shows continued variability of losses. Ultimately this story has little to do with climate change, although the casual reader might easily infer that this is further proof of impending catastrophe.

If the debate on climate change is going to progress beyond simple name-calling we have to start doing better than this and stop trying to sensationalise what are very ordinary statistics.

Add that to our list of new year’s resolutions.