Following news of wildfires sweeping through Rhodes, Corfu and southern Europe, Partners at international law firm RPC, Lucy Dyson and Toby Savage, warn of the increasing risk of wildfire in the UK.
According to Reuters, at least 21,500 people have been displaced due to the Greek wildfires, at least five were reported dead and many more were injured.
Lucy Dyson, Partner at RPC, international property and casualty team, commented: “Climate change and the rising risk of wildfires are having a huge impact across the world, particularly in southern Europe with the current devastating situation affecting Rhodes and now Corfu.
“Wildfires this summer have also severely affected Canada and the United States. Some homeowners have been told their properties are no longer insurable and some insurers are pulling out of fire-prone areas altogether.”
Dyson also highlighted the wildfires in California, and the gravity of the economic losses these catastrophes hold.
“The wildfires in California were a primary reason behind Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) filing for bankruptcy in 2019, after the company came under pressure from billions of dollars in claims, following allegations that poorly maintained equipment had contributed to the start of wildfires in 2017 and 2018,” said Dyson.
Toby Savage, Partner at RPC added that the wildfires could pose an increased risk for energy and industrial assets both in the UK and internationally.
Savage commented, “In the UK we don’t have the same scale of open land that wildfires could rip through, but we are still at risk, with that risk rising as heatwaves become a more regular and sustained occurrence.”
Climate change is bringing with it the potential for new risks and extreme weather events in areas and locations where those have not previously been accounted for, explained the pair.
“While the UK does not have the same vast swathes of land in the US, Canada, Australia and as seen in previous weeks, southern Europe – where wildfires have swept across hundreds of square miles – the potential damage caused by such an event to energy and industrial assets could be devastating,” Savage concluded.
Since this report has been published, there has been a devastating wildfire in Maui, Hawaii which has been estimated to cause insured losses of $2.5 billion to $4.5 billion by analysts at Bloomberg.
