<
https://reneweconomy.com.au/will-climate-linked-extreme-weather-make-renewables-projects-uninsurable/>
"In October 2018, severe winds hit the Oakey 2 solar farm, which was still
under construction in the Darling Downs region of southeast Queensland.
The storm damaged 2,000 of the site’s modules, delaying its completion. Then,
in January 2020, the same site was hit by yet another severe storm, which
exacerbated delays and led to a major write-down of the project’s value, to the
tune of A$12.5 million.
This was not the only time severe weather has damaged infrastructure at a
renewable asset in Australia.
In February of this year, a two-year-old wind turbine at Berrybank wind farm,
near Geelong, collapsed in high winds, during a damaging thunderstorm.
Investigations into that event are ongoing, but a lightning strike is being
considered as a potential culprit.
Perhaps surprisingly, in a country almost characterised by extremes of weather
and climate, these have been relatively isolated incidents in Australia – at
least for now – despite several years of natural disasters, including floods
and fires, that were likely exacerbated by climate change.
But a new report from global renewables insurer GCube has found that natural
disasters and extreme weather events are leading to more frequent and more
severe insurance claims from renewables projects around the world.
It says they represent an emerging threat to the industry – the great irony, of
course, being that natural disasters and extreme weather are, and will
increasingly be, exacerbated as global average temperatures rise.
“The insurance market, from a natural catastrophe standpoint, has looked at
earthquakes, hurricanes, and flood risk traditionally,” explains GCube CEO and
founder Fraser McLachlan. “But what’s emerged over the last four to seven years
is that weather is changing globally, and there are a whole bunch of new perils
coming into the mix.”
And the report warns that Australia will likely not escape these impacts."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
