Insurance companies and climate change: Interview with Mark Trexler

Dr. Mark C. Trexler directs the Climatographers’ work on climate risk knowledge management.  He was previously Director of Climate Risk for DNV based in Oslo, Norway, and prior to that directed Global Consulting Services for EcoSecurities. His work on climate change dates back to the World Resources Institute (1988-1991), and as President of Trexler Climate + Energy Services (TC+ES) from 1991 to 2007. TC+ES was the first consulting firm in the United States to specialize in business climate change risk management.

In addition to private-sector clients around the world, Mark has worked with national and international clients including The Nature Conservancy, the United Nations Development Programme, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and the Global Environment Facility. 

Mark is widely published on the technical and policy issues relating to climate change mitigation and carbon markets, has served as a Lead Author for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), and is a member of the editorial board of Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies, a leading climate journal.  Mark’s graduate degrees are from UC Berkeley, he has spent almost 10 years living abroad, and speaks five languages.

PG: Beginning this fall, all students at Arizona State University are now also required to take a class on sustainability. How good a beginning and what should follow next?

MT:  When you and I were on the phone I think I recall seeing a reference to the fact this requirement could be met with a course in wildlife conservation. I thought that was silly. But when I did go deeper into the actual requirement this is what I find: 

“The Sustainability requirement provides students with an interdisciplinary understanding of socio-ecological systems in relation to global challenges and opportunities. The learning objectives emphasize systems thinking, where human and non-human systems are understood as intimately connected, with human actions affecting all life on a planet with limits and boundaries. Students should also become familiar with how cultural, political, economic, social and ethical beliefs, practices and systems are related to and impact planetary systems. Students will use course concepts and systems and futures thinking to address contemporary questions or challenges.

Learning outcomes

Upon completion of a course in Sustainability, students will be able to do the following:

1. demonstrate an understanding of the earth and its ecosphere, including the measures that indicate their capacities and limits
2. trace historical impacts of a range of socio-economic, political or cultural choices on integrated human-environmental well-being
3. envision pathways toward futures characterized by integrated human-environmental well-being
4. articulate an approach to addressing contemporary questions or challenges that employs concepts or practices of sustainability”

That doesn’t sound half-bad!   Don’t really know why it’s called a “sustainability requirement,” which is pretty close to being a meaningless term.  In terms of the content, I think it’s appalling in today’s world that most students are graduating from college having met math requirements that they’ll never have use for again, while this kind of absolutely foundational understanding of human/environmental systems is apparently not required at all.   So I guess this is a great initiative, although seems radically insufficient and decades too late in coming!

PG: As a champion of systems thinking, do you believe that to be the ideal way forward?

MT: Well, that makes it sounds like systems thinking could be “the” silver bullet.  Yet that is entirely at odds with the whole premise of systems thinking.  I think systems thinking is critical to tackling any Risk 2.0 problem in today’s world.  But that’s just the beginning of the story.  You still have to figure out how to communicate, teach, and learn the substance of the system you’re talking about (at whatever level is appropriate, from K-12 on up).  Systems thinking is a prerequisite to solving problems, but is far from the solution.   

PG: How do you reconcile with the fact that Jack Welch, “The Man Who Broke Capitalism” and “destroyer of corporate America”, continues to inspire multiple generations. As does Ayn Rand?

MT:  You know, I’d have a hard time besting ChatGPT’s answer to this question! 😊😊 There’s one paragraph in there that strikes me as particularly telling.  Namely that successful people (and the people that want to emulate them) have every confirmation bias reason to want to believe that it was THEIR individual traits and hard work that accounts for their success, and that if government would just get out of the way they could accomplish so much more that could then trickle down to everyone else.  That is clearly the story that will make them feel best about themselves. It’s sort of like asking whether the King of England believes in the monarchy and expecting a “no.”  It’s almost a tautological question.  

PG: While Welch credited Peter Drucker as his inspiration – he amplified Milton Friedman’s mantra on shareholder. Hasn’t it brought us where we are/headed?

MT:  Well, in many respects Peter Drucker’s focus on management efficiency and Milton Friedman’s focus on shareholder returns are perfectly consistent.   And in all fairness to Milton Friedman, companies were ignoring economic externalities long before Milton Friedman gave them “permission” to do so in the interests of shareholders.  I suspect that Milton Friedman might have recognized the “small world model” nature of his argument, and might have argued that as part of that small world model government is regulating companies to ensure that necessary externalities are internalized.  

In some ways suggesting that Milton Friedman has brought us to where we are/headed is analogous to saying that oil company misinformation has brought us to where we are/headed on climate change.  There is certainly an element of truth there, and easy to treat Friedman and oil companies as the scapegoat.  But in the case of climate change, the much bigger issue is that fossil fuels are an amazingly convenient and low-cost way of powering things like industrial revolutions, economic growth, and the global middle class.  They just have “one small problem” in the form of releasing millions of years of natural carbon storage back into the atmosphere in a very short timeframe.  And the oil companies have done their best to interfere with efforts to solve that problem, but that is a far cry from demonstrating that they “caused” the problem. 

PG: Do you think this ongoing obsession with shareholders undermines the effectiveness of Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG)?

MT:  There is an obvious contradiction between focusing on shareholder returns while promoting voluntary pursuit of ESG.  Focusing on shareholder concerns implicitly gives a company permission to heavily discount the future, to take advantage of economic externalities, to play down worker health and safety, et., all of which are fundamentally at odds with the stated goals of ESG.   In what world can both be achieved?   Certainly not in a world in which everything is left up to companies to decide, without the guidance of public policies and measures.

PG: Could this overarching influence also be responsible for insurers missing out on the double materiality and thus continue being reactive?  

MT:  In what sense are insurers “missing out on double materiality?”   Why would we expect insurers (or any company) to really prioritize double materiality?   Why is it their responsibility to look out for societal interests under our economic and political systems? 

PG: What must immediately change if insurers must make a course correction to educate the rank and file?

MT:  Again, why “must they” make a course correction.   Insurance companies have a lot of flexibility to adapt to climate change by changing premiums, by changing what they will insure, etc. etc.   They are probably one of the most resilient sectors to physical climate risks, and they’ll make money as other risks get worse as well.  I’ve never figured out why we would expect insurance companies to lead the charge when it comes to educating the rank and file.   If we prohibited insurance companies from rapidly increasing premiums, or dropping lots of policies, in principle we would incentivize them to take climate change more seriously.   But at this point we’d probably just be pushing them towards bankruptcy (since it will take too much time to change the course of climate change).  

PG: Many thanks Mark for this very ‘Trexlerian’ perspective! Much appreciate your sense of humour in the Time of Climate Breakdown.