2/23/13, "Interesting Update on the Sandy "Hurricane Deductible"," Roger Pielke, Jr.
"Yesterday the NHC released an update to its hurricane reanalysis page which lists Sandy as a hurricane in the state of NY, but not NJ. The new update is consistent with the recent Sandy assessment, but far more back and white -- a storm is or is not on the list as a hurricane.
In New York following Sandy this happened (emphasis added, and for more background go here):
The New York State Department of Financial Services and Governor Cuomo informed the insurance industry that hurricane deductibles should not be applied. The decision was based on the fact that the storm did not sustain hurricane-force winds while over New York.The State and Governor were incorrect in that judgment, according to the NHC. What that implies is that a bunch of homeowers (technically/legally) may owe insurers a refund (if they have already been paid for losses) or are owed less in payments under their insurance policies (if they have not been paid).
In practice, there is unlikely to be a large public demand for enforcement of the hurricane deductible, and insurance companies may decide that it is not worth their effort, as most had their losses covered by reinsurers. Will any reinsurers take a closer look? I'd guess it is unlikely, and if they did we might never hear about it anyway.
As a case study in the application of "evidence-based policy" you won't find a better one than the hurricane deductible.
Sometimes "evidence" matters, sometimes it does not. Sometime we care about whether it matters, sometimes we do not." via Tom Nelson
=====================================
From NOAA hurricane notes, hurricane "all time" records (severity, damage, etc.) are incomplete due to sparseness of population in US coastal areas in earlier years:
"Before the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic coasts became settled, hurricanes may have been underestimated in their intensity or missed completely for small-sized systems."...
"Chronological List of All Continental United States
Hurricanes: 1851-2012."
"Additional Note: Because of the sparseness of townsand cities before 1900 in some coastal locations
along the United States,
the above list is not complete
for all states.
Before the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic coasts
became settled, hurricanes may
have been underestimated in their intensity
or missed completely for
small-sized systems (i.e., 2004's Hurricane
Charley). The following list provides estimated dates
when accurate tropical
cyclone records began for specified regions
of the United States based upon U.S Census
reports and other historical analyses.
Years in parenthesis indicate possible
starting dates
for reliable records before the 1850s
that may be
available with additional research:
Texas-south > 1880, Texas-central > 1851,
Texas-north > 1860, Louisiana > 1880, Mississippi > 1851, Alabama < 1851 (1830),
Florida-northwest > 1880, Florida-southwest > 1900, Florida-southeast > 1900,
Florida-northeast > 1880, Georgia < 1851 (1800), South Carolina < 1851 (1760),
North Carolina < 1851 (1760), Virginia < 1851 (1700), Maryland < 1851 (1760),
Delaware < 1851 (1700), New Jersey < 1851 (1760),
New York < 1851 (1700), Connecticut < 1851 (1660), Rhode Island < 1851 (1760),
Massachusetts < 1851 (1660),
New Hampshire < 1851 (1660), and Maine < 1851 (1790)." (end of pg.)
"The impact of the hurricane on individual
U.S.states [is] based upon the Saffir-Simpson
Hurricane Wind Scale....
The Florida peninsula, by the nature of its
relatively landmass, is all considered
as coastal in this database."...
===========================================
2/12/13, "The NHC Sandy Report,"
Roger Pielke, Jr.
"The National Hurricane Center has issued its
final report on Hurricane Sandy(here in PDF).
Kudos to the scientists at NHC for their
fast and comprehensive work.
As I guessed, Sandy will remain categorized
as a
"post-tropical cyclone" upon making
landfall in the US. This determination
had already been established in a New Jersey
executive order and widely implemented
in insurance payouts. To determine otherwise
would have wreaked havoc, regardless of
the scientific
justifications for the decision.
Interestingly however, future Sandy-like
storms
may be classified differently, at least
in terms of how watches
and warnings are issued:
"[T]he NWS is exploring two proposals that,
if adopted, would result in some changes
to NWS products and warnings.
The first proposal originates
from the unique situation posed by
Hurricane Sandy;it would give the NHC
the option to continue issuing
formal advisories on post-tropical
cyclones as long as those systems pose
a significant threat to life
and property, and it would give the NWS
the option to keep hurricane and
tropical storm watches and warnings
in place for those systems."
The second proposal focuses on developing
an
explicit warning product for storm surges.If NWS adopts the first proposal, then it would mean that a future storm identical to Sandy in every respect would trigger the so-called "hurricane deductible" for insurance policies that are based on the issuance of a hurricane warning in the affected state. So from the perspective of insurance, Sandy was not a hurricane but a future Sandy might well be. Homeowners and insurance companies take note.
The other important news in the report is the preliminary US damage estimate, at $50 billion, which is the apples to apples number to use in comparing Sandy to the losses from our normalized loss database. It is also, coincidentally, the value I used in the figure below updating the normalized loss dataset (1900) through 2012:"
.
Alert commenters to this article correctly anticipate the political class
using any opportunity to steal from
defenseless taxpayers and expand federal government: (See Angelo Codevilla):"1. Mark B. said...
How does the government decide when insurance companies will pay out? The companies have a contract with policy holders, based on the existing rules. If the government changes the rules - to satisfy politicians and their constituents - why wouldn't the insurance companies just change the policies to account for the government fiddle?
charlesH said...
@mark
They will increase their rates. The only danger is somehow the politicians figure out a way for the general taxpayer to pickup more of the damage
n.n said...
Is this why it's so difficult to distinguish between cause and effect? Without an insider knowledge to explain outcomes, it would be impossible for someone today, or perhaps ten or twenty years later, to properly characterize a situation based solely on the available "facts".
Opportunistic behavior is a basis for corruption and is especially heinous when manifested in government, since our civil servants have a granted and manufactured authority to affect all of our lives.
Mark B.:
Yeah, the risk models will have to be adjusted to compensate for opportunistic behavior. However, I would be greatly surprised if that was not already considered. Human nature, after all, has not fundamentally changed. Not with "enlightenment", anytime thereafter, and certainly not today.
"Caucus member Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA), ranking member of the House Appropriations Committee's interior and environment panel, cited the GAO findings of the report as one of the reasons for Congress to act.
“We can't predict how much this is going to cost us, although we know that Hurricane Sandy was not unique.
We're going to have to continue to put out tens of billions of dollars every year, probably more every year, to deal with ever more devastating weather events,” Moran said at the press conference."...
CO2 has plunged in the US:
6/4/12, “Climate change stunner: USA leads world in CO2 cuts since 2006,” Vancouver Observer, Saxifrage
“Not only that, but as my top chart shows, US CO2 emissions are falling even faster than what President Obama pledged in the global Copenhagen Accord.… Here is the biggest shocker of all: the average American’s CO2 emissions are down to levels not seen since 1964 --over half a century ago. …Coal is the number two source of CO2 for Americans. Today the average American burns an amount similar to what they did in 1955, and even less than they did in the 1940s. …It is exactly America’s historical role of biggest and dirtiest that makes their sharp decline in CO2 pollution so noteworthy
and potentially game changing at the global level.”...
The CO2 terror industry is financed by the US taxpayer:
1/11/11, “Big Money in Climate Change: Who Gives, Who Gets,” Al Fin
-------------------------------------------------------
In 2011 alone the US spent “$10.6 million (taxpayer dollars) a day to study, combat, and educate about climate change.” 1/5/11
7/16/10, "America's Ruling Class-and the perils of Revolution," by Angelo Codevilla, from American Spectator. To view on one page,
"America's Ruling Class-and the perils of Revolution."
.
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