Mercury Insurance Builds Climate Science Team

Steve Bennett will lead a team of experts focusing on how risk mitigation can positively influence property and casualty insurance

Mercury Insurance, a leading provider of property and casualty insurance, has appointed Steve Bennett as its senior director of climate and catastrophe science. In this new position, Bennett will build and lead a team dedicated to helping identify ways Mercury and its policyholders can work together to better prepare for – and be more resilient – in the face of increasingly severe climate-driven weather events.

This move is the latest in a series of investments by Mercury to better understand and counteract forces facing insurance providers in high-risk areas. Climate change, population growth and resulting urban expansion has placed the insurance industry at a crossroads, resulting in many insurers pulling back from areas prone to wildfires, hurricanes and other catastrophic climate events. Mercury has taken a different approach to this challenge over the past year, working with homeowners, municipalities and governments to create more resistant and insurable risks. The result has led to Mercury writing more policies in areas where its competitors have cancelled or non-renewed coverage for tens of thousands of consumers.

“Mercury is constantly looking for ways to say ‘yes’ to consumers, and to do that we are taking a science-based approach to risk,” said Bennett. “When customers do their part to harden their homes and communities from potential catastrophic events, we will do ours by extending affordable coverage options to those who may have difficulty securing policies. I’m proud to be part of a larger Mercury vision dedicated to ensuring that investments in mitigation and smarter rebuilding translate into a healthier and more efficient insurance marketplace for everyone.”

Mercury’s efforts on this front have been challenged over the past year in dramatic ways. Late last year, Mercury announced that it was the first major insurer to begin writing homeowners coverage for homes in Paradise, CA, a town largely destroyed by the Camp Fire in November 2018. The move was made possible through the efforts of local and state government, the Insurance Institute for Business and Home Safety (IBHS) – and the homeowners – who worked in lockstep to reimagine zoning, construction and many other aspects of the rebuilding process. Mercury leadership closely followed the progress in Paradise, taking numerous trips to the area to see the transformation first-hand and to use the new parameters instituted for wildfire mitigation in their assessment of risk in that area.

Following Mercury’s return to Paradise, the catastrophic fires that ravaged Pacific Palisades and Altadena earlier this year once again underscored the enormity of the challenge. “Mercury continues to develop a different approach to managing catastrophic risks,” said Victor Joseph, president and chief operating officer of Mercury Insurance. “We look at geography, prevailing wind patterns, building methods and materials, and policy concentration and apply this knowledge to individual risks. It’s not good enough to simply rule out entire zip codes. There are ways to significantly reduce risk even in the highest danger areas that would make these risks acceptable for Mercury.”

“The lessons learned in Paradise helped us better understand the importance of all constituencies, including individual homeowners, city, state and federal organizations, builders, urban planners and insurance companies. We all need to work together to rebuild in a way that reduces the risk of future catastrophes. Steve and his team will strengthen Mercury’s ability to understand and adapt to this complex equation, providing our company with a clearer understanding of the challenges posed by climate-driven catastrophes while also helping our policyholders better prepare for these events.”

Bennett joins Mercury with over three decades of leadership at the nexus of extreme weather, climate risk and effective risk management.

Information sourced from Mercury Insurance. Learn more by contacting ssmith@pacificcommunicationsgroup.com.