Lloyd’s urged to stop insuring fossil fuels
'Twenty-three faith leaders called on the world’s largest insurance market to ‘show leadership’ by ending insurance for all new fossil fuel projects.'
Britain Yearly Meeting (BYM) joined other faith groups to urge Lloyd’s of London to do more to tackle climate change.
Writing in The Times on 24 April, twenty-three faith leaders called on the world’s largest insurance market to ‘show leadership’ by ending insurance for all new fossil fuel projects.
‘Those who back new fossil fuel projects have a moral responsibility to change course,’ they wrote.
Signatories including Nicola Brady, the general secretary of Churches Together in England and Ireland, and Kamran Shezad, the director of the Islamic Foundation for Ecology and Environmental Sciences, urged Lloyd’s not to provide (re)insurance for the East African Crude Oil Pipeline. It should also phase out existing fossil fuel insurance, they said.
BYM said that Lloyd’s members, who insure around forty per cent of the global energy market, have a decisive role to play in preventing climate damage but lag behind other insurance companies.
Since March last year, Swiss Re, Munich Re and Allianz have all announced new policies moving away from oil and gas. The signatories urged Lloyd’s to follow their example at its impending AGM.
Writing on the Quakers in Britain website, BYM pointed out that ‘the ten most expensive climate disasters in 2022 cost a combined [US]$168 billion, mostly in insured losses, with the true cost being much higher. And in the first few months of 2023 there has been flooding and landslides in Brazil, Mozambique and California, cyclones in Vanuatu and Madagascar, and an unprecedented winter heat wave in Europe’.
The letter welcomed Lloyd’s introduction of phasing out insurance for coal and tar sands, but noted that these guidelines remain voluntary, and that the market has no policy on conventional oil and gas.
The full letter has been sent to Bruce Carnegie-Brown, Lloyd’s of London chairman, and John Neal, chief executive, asking for a meeting to discuss the issues raised.
The signatories include Anglican bishops, Hindu Climate Action, Eco Judaism, and the Islamic Foundation for Ecology and Environmental Science.
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