The Dead Zone: What Climate Change Will Do to America by Mid-Century
December 9th, 2025
Via The Atlantic, a look at how many places in the U.S. may become uninhabitable. Many people may be on their own. Earlier this year, in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains, a graveyard was spared by the fire that sent thousands of Los Angeles residents fleeing into the coal-black night. Here, in Mountain […]
Read more »Climate ‘Shock’ Is Eroding Some Home Values. New Data Shows How Much.
November 19th, 2025
Via New York Times, a look at how climate ‘shock’ is eroding home values: Even after she escaped rising floodwaters by wading away from her home in chest-deep water during Hurricane Rita in 2005, Sandra Rojas, now 69, stayed put. A fifth-generation resident of Lafitte, La., a small coastal community, she raised her home with […]
Read more »How Climate Risks Are Putting Home Insurance Out of Reach
September 18th, 2025
Via Yale’s e360, a look at how – after years underestimating the risks posed by climate-fueled disasters – the U.S. home insurance industry is in turmoil. In vulnerable areas, rising insurance costs are upending housing markets and communities, as homeowners scramble to try to find insurance they can afford. For decades, Sanibel Island, one of […]
Read more »Is the Future Insurable? How Climate Change Is Shrinking the Range of Insurability
August 18th, 2025
Via Probable Futures, a thoughtful commentary on how global climate change is shrinking the range of insurability: Spencer Glendon, Founder of Probable Futures, Carolyn Kousky, Founder of Insurance for Good and Associate Vice President of Economics and Policy at the Environmental Defense Fund, and Barney Schauble, Principal at greenthread, wrote this article in collaboration. Spencer, Carolyn, and Barney have […]
Read more »California Is Running Out of Safe Places to Build Homes Due to Fires, Rising Seas
July 4th, 2025
Via Bloomberg, a look at how climate-related risks hamper the state’s ability to solve a housing crunch. It’s not alone. California, gripped by a housing shortage that is forcing families from the state, wants to build 2.5 million homes. But it’s running out of safe places to put them. Much of the land best suited for […]
Read more »Cracks Starting To Show: Homeowners Battle Insurers Over $2.9 Trillion Climate Risk
June 14th, 2025
Via Bloomberg, a report on how subsidence is a worsening risk and insurers don’t want to pick up the tab. When Bernard Weisse first noticed a tiny crack in the outer wall of his house on the outskirts of Paris, he dismissed it as little more than a nuisance. But in the four years since, […]
Read more »'Black Swans' are highly improbable events that come as a surprise, have major disruptive effects, and that are often rationalized after the fact as if they had been predictable to begin with. In our rapidly warming world, such events are occurring ever more frequently and include wildfires, floods, extreme heat, and drought.
'Green Shoots' is a term used to describe signs of economic recovery or positive data during a downturn. It references a period of growth and recovery, when plants start to show signs of health and life, and, therefore, has been employed as a metaphor for a recovering economy.
It is my hope that Black Swans / Green Shoots will help readers understand both climate-activated risk and opportunity so that you may invest in, advise, or lead organizations in the context of increasing pressures of global urbanization, resource scarcity, and perils relating to climate change. I believe that the tools of business and finance can help individuals, businesses, and global society make informed choices about who and what to protect, and I hope that this blog provides some insight into the policy and private sector tools used to assess investments in resilient reinforcement, response, or recovery.