Adding Up the Costs of Extreme Weather
31/12/22 08:12
Seventy-five years ago, on Christmas Eve in 1947, drilling started at Peace River Natural Gas No. 1 in northeastern British Columbia, which would become the first productive natural gas well in the province.
Earlier that year, Leduc No. 1 launched the oil boom in Alberta, putting Canada on the road to becoming a global oil exporter.
Successful oil production in British Columbia followed in the mid-1950s at the Boundary Lake oilfield in northeastern BC.
Three-quarters of a century later, British Columbia is feeling the effects of climate change, yet its contribution to global warming continues through incentives for fossil fuel exploration and infrastructure. Meanwhile, it struggles to meet commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
The extreme weather we experienced in 2021 reveals the magnitude of the economic cost of not taking the serious steps needed to mitigate climate change.
The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives released A Climate Reckoning by senior economist Marc Lee and resource policy analyst Ben Parfitt.
They calculate the real economic costs from extreme weather events in 2021 are as high as 17 billion dollars – and that doesn’t include health-related costs.
Lee says the costs are far higher than the insured losses, which typically are the focus in the aftermath of disasters such as those of 2021.
“We had the full gamut of extreme heat and wildfires, and flooding and landslides to contend with, in all, we estimate that ranges from about 10.6 to 17.1 Billion dollars in economic costs.”
He explains that what gets reported in the aftermath of such events are losses covered by insurance, and when it comes to things like wildfires and floods, that figure does not reflect the full impact.
According to Lee, insurance would have paid for just five to eight per cent of the total damages in 2021.
“The rest are in other areas, the non-insured damages that are paid by individuals and businesses, government expenditures for emergency response and clean up, and rebuilding,” says Lee, “that ends up being about half of the total.”
Lee points to lost income for workers as a necessary consideration, especially when people miss work because extreme heat has closed their workplace, or they can't get to work because infrastructure is down.
The study shows a substantial supply chain impact from wildfires that blocked the CN and Canadian Pacific rail lines, stranding thousands of rail cars and causing wage losses for workers.
Estimated wage losses due to work slowdowns in some key sectors were from $281–$463 million.
While industrial wage losses were more modest because fewer workers were affected, higher earning losses involved workers in retail, accommodation, and food services.
These costs are on top of the direct costs of fighting wildfires that reached $719 million, well above the budgeted allocation of $136 million and the yearly average of $301 million per year going back to 2008.
Then in November, an atmospheric river unleashed a deluge that caused extensive flooding and landslides.
Four highways connecting Vancouver to the rest of Canada were severed.
CN and Canadian Pacific Railways did not see a return of capacity for more than a month after the washouts.
In late June, however, all that was still to come.
As the month drew to a close, it became stiflingly hot.
A heat dome settled over much of the province. Daytime temperatures reached highs never felt before, and there was insufficient nighttime cooling to provide relief.
It began on June 24 and peaked on June 28-29, with temperatures rising to well over 40 degrees Celsius in many parts of the province.
People without air conditioning sweltered, and the BC coroners service later reported 619 people succumbed to the heat.
Metro Vancouver is accustomed to more temperate conditions, and for more than 450 residents, those four days were deadly.
Environment and Climate Change Canada says a heat wave is three or more days of temperatures above 32 degrees Celsius – the June 2021 heat dome was far beyond that.
The area covered by the event was immense, reaching into Alberta, up to the Yukon and Northwest Territories, and as far south as California.
There were more than 50 deaths from the heat in Alberta, at least 112 in Washington State, and 116 in Oregon.
A rapid assessment of the heat dome by the World Weather Attribution initiative determined “an event such as the Pacific Northwest 2021 heatwave is still rare or extremely rare in today’s climate, yet would be virtually impossible without human-caused climate change. As warming continues, it will become a lot less rare.”
Lee and Parfitt discovered the heat dome had a widespread economic effect on workers, especially those working outdoors or in non-air-conditioned spaces.
Food services, construction, agriculture, and manufacturing suffered the most.
Their estimate ranges from $205 to $328 million in lost income, with an additional $34–$84 million in lost productivity.
Emergency calls to 911 doubled relative to normal, with significant physical and mental health tolls on overwhelmed paramedics and related workers.
Lee and Parfitt also studied damages suffered by Indigenous communities, vulnerable or marginalized populations such as those with low incomes, renters, women, seniors, immigrants, and people with disabilities.
Wildfires affect traditional economic activities like fishing, hunting, and trapping.
The rapid spread of a wildfire demands a quick evacuation. Low-income households, people without vehicles, or those unable to drive are made more vulnerable in areas affected by wildfires.
Though the fires were in the interior, smoke flowed down valleys affecting air quality hundreds of kilometres away, including for about three million residents in metro Vancouver and the Fraser Valley.
As bad as the extreme weather of 2021 was, in reality, 2022 was only slightly better when seen from a worldwide perspective.
In its review of weather for the year, the World Meteorological Organization concludes, “the events of 2022 once again underlined the clear need to do much more to cut greenhouse gas emissions.”
While 2022 did not bring such disruptive weather events, a level-5 drought developed over large areas of the province. On Vancouver Island, home to ancient old-growth rainforests, very little rain fell from labour day until mid-November.
On December 21, as heavy snow lay on Vancouver Island and the south coast and another storm approached, Environment and Climate Change Canada published its top 20 weather events of 2022.
In the news release, ECCC stated that while extreme weather events are known to happen, “human-caused climate change is affecting the frequency, duration, and intensity of many climate-related hazards and disasters around the world, including in Canada.”
On the same day, ECCC issued another news release about new regulations on ZEV (zero emissions vehicle) sales targets for manufacturers and importers. It stated: “The regulations will require that at least 20 percent of new vehicles sold in Canada will be zero emission by 2026, at least 60 percent by 2030, and 100 percent by 2035.”
Ironically, governments acknowledge climate change while they support fossil fuel expansion.
Lee says the bill for dealing with extreme weather events in 2021 reveals a new benchmark for planners.
“We need to anticipate that these types of events are going to happen with increasing frequency as we go forward.”
He says more investments are needed to get ahead of the curve and equip communities to handle extreme heat, prepare for wildfires, and improve dikes to meet modern engineering standards and better withstand higher water levels.
Lee says it will be costly but necessary as we face billions of dollars in losses from future extreme weather events.
He has devoted 15 years to studying and writing about how British Columbia and Canada can reduce greenhouse gas emissions and how that intersects with competing interests that create growth in oil and gas through infrastructures such as LNG terminals and pipelines.
Lee says the massive economic costs make it clear that climate change has already altered our weather.
“Climate change isn't just something that's going to happen decades into the future in other parts of the world, or that's going to drown polar bears,” Lee says, “and British Columbia, along with everywhere else in the world, really needs to rapidly change to shift off of fossil fuels so that we can reduce the tendency of these things to get worse and worse over time.”
Lee and Parfitt talked to people on the front lines of extreme weather in 2021.
Among them was a farmer in Dawson Creek unable to salvage his crop as “the berries just cooked” in the field, and another in the Fraser Valley who laid off 45 farm workers and only kept the finance person to ensure bills got paid.
Some scientists conclude changes to the jet stream from the continued heating of the region around the North Pole will lead to more extreme weather.
The jet stream crosses the northern hemisphere from west to east, powered by the earth’s rotation and influenced by the temperature differences between the arctic and more southerly latitudes.
When that west-to-east flow becomes disrupted, the jet stream develops extreme waves, with regions of intense high pressure, or heat waves, building up behind those waves. If they remain in place long, a heat dome becomes more likely.
The more the circulation of air high above the Northern Hemisphere, stirred by the jet stream, changes during summer, the longer the heat waves will become, and their intensity will increase.
Keeping the refinery flares glowing is turning up the planetary heat; the consequences will be far-reaching.
Earlier that year, Leduc No. 1 launched the oil boom in Alberta, putting Canada on the road to becoming a global oil exporter.
Successful oil production in British Columbia followed in the mid-1950s at the Boundary Lake oilfield in northeastern BC.
Three-quarters of a century later, British Columbia is feeling the effects of climate change, yet its contribution to global warming continues through incentives for fossil fuel exploration and infrastructure. Meanwhile, it struggles to meet commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
The extreme weather we experienced in 2021 reveals the magnitude of the economic cost of not taking the serious steps needed to mitigate climate change.
The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives released A Climate Reckoning by senior economist Marc Lee and resource policy analyst Ben Parfitt.
They calculate the real economic costs from extreme weather events in 2021 are as high as 17 billion dollars – and that doesn’t include health-related costs.
Lee says the costs are far higher than the insured losses, which typically are the focus in the aftermath of disasters such as those of 2021.
“We had the full gamut of extreme heat and wildfires, and flooding and landslides to contend with, in all, we estimate that ranges from about 10.6 to 17.1 Billion dollars in economic costs.”
He explains that what gets reported in the aftermath of such events are losses covered by insurance, and when it comes to things like wildfires and floods, that figure does not reflect the full impact.
According to Lee, insurance would have paid for just five to eight per cent of the total damages in 2021.
“The rest are in other areas, the non-insured damages that are paid by individuals and businesses, government expenditures for emergency response and clean up, and rebuilding,” says Lee, “that ends up being about half of the total.”
Lee points to lost income for workers as a necessary consideration, especially when people miss work because extreme heat has closed their workplace, or they can't get to work because infrastructure is down.
The study shows a substantial supply chain impact from wildfires that blocked the CN and Canadian Pacific rail lines, stranding thousands of rail cars and causing wage losses for workers.
Estimated wage losses due to work slowdowns in some key sectors were from $281–$463 million.
While industrial wage losses were more modest because fewer workers were affected, higher earning losses involved workers in retail, accommodation, and food services.
These costs are on top of the direct costs of fighting wildfires that reached $719 million, well above the budgeted allocation of $136 million and the yearly average of $301 million per year going back to 2008.
Then in November, an atmospheric river unleashed a deluge that caused extensive flooding and landslides.
Four highways connecting Vancouver to the rest of Canada were severed.
CN and Canadian Pacific Railways did not see a return of capacity for more than a month after the washouts.
In late June, however, all that was still to come.
As the month drew to a close, it became stiflingly hot.
A heat dome settled over much of the province. Daytime temperatures reached highs never felt before, and there was insufficient nighttime cooling to provide relief.
It began on June 24 and peaked on June 28-29, with temperatures rising to well over 40 degrees Celsius in many parts of the province.
People without air conditioning sweltered, and the BC coroners service later reported 619 people succumbed to the heat.
Metro Vancouver is accustomed to more temperate conditions, and for more than 450 residents, those four days were deadly.
Environment and Climate Change Canada says a heat wave is three or more days of temperatures above 32 degrees Celsius – the June 2021 heat dome was far beyond that.
The area covered by the event was immense, reaching into Alberta, up to the Yukon and Northwest Territories, and as far south as California.
There were more than 50 deaths from the heat in Alberta, at least 112 in Washington State, and 116 in Oregon.
A rapid assessment of the heat dome by the World Weather Attribution initiative determined “an event such as the Pacific Northwest 2021 heatwave is still rare or extremely rare in today’s climate, yet would be virtually impossible without human-caused climate change. As warming continues, it will become a lot less rare.”
Lee and Parfitt discovered the heat dome had a widespread economic effect on workers, especially those working outdoors or in non-air-conditioned spaces.
Food services, construction, agriculture, and manufacturing suffered the most.
Their estimate ranges from $205 to $328 million in lost income, with an additional $34–$84 million in lost productivity.
Emergency calls to 911 doubled relative to normal, with significant physical and mental health tolls on overwhelmed paramedics and related workers.
Lee and Parfitt also studied damages suffered by Indigenous communities, vulnerable or marginalized populations such as those with low incomes, renters, women, seniors, immigrants, and people with disabilities.
Wildfires affect traditional economic activities like fishing, hunting, and trapping.
The rapid spread of a wildfire demands a quick evacuation. Low-income households, people without vehicles, or those unable to drive are made more vulnerable in areas affected by wildfires.
Though the fires were in the interior, smoke flowed down valleys affecting air quality hundreds of kilometres away, including for about three million residents in metro Vancouver and the Fraser Valley.
As bad as the extreme weather of 2021 was, in reality, 2022 was only slightly better when seen from a worldwide perspective.
In its review of weather for the year, the World Meteorological Organization concludes, “the events of 2022 once again underlined the clear need to do much more to cut greenhouse gas emissions.”
While 2022 did not bring such disruptive weather events, a level-5 drought developed over large areas of the province. On Vancouver Island, home to ancient old-growth rainforests, very little rain fell from labour day until mid-November.
On December 21, as heavy snow lay on Vancouver Island and the south coast and another storm approached, Environment and Climate Change Canada published its top 20 weather events of 2022.
In the news release, ECCC stated that while extreme weather events are known to happen, “human-caused climate change is affecting the frequency, duration, and intensity of many climate-related hazards and disasters around the world, including in Canada.”
On the same day, ECCC issued another news release about new regulations on ZEV (zero emissions vehicle) sales targets for manufacturers and importers. It stated: “The regulations will require that at least 20 percent of new vehicles sold in Canada will be zero emission by 2026, at least 60 percent by 2030, and 100 percent by 2035.”
Ironically, governments acknowledge climate change while they support fossil fuel expansion.
Lee says the bill for dealing with extreme weather events in 2021 reveals a new benchmark for planners.
“We need to anticipate that these types of events are going to happen with increasing frequency as we go forward.”
He says more investments are needed to get ahead of the curve and equip communities to handle extreme heat, prepare for wildfires, and improve dikes to meet modern engineering standards and better withstand higher water levels.
Lee says it will be costly but necessary as we face billions of dollars in losses from future extreme weather events.
He has devoted 15 years to studying and writing about how British Columbia and Canada can reduce greenhouse gas emissions and how that intersects with competing interests that create growth in oil and gas through infrastructures such as LNG terminals and pipelines.
Lee says the massive economic costs make it clear that climate change has already altered our weather.
“Climate change isn't just something that's going to happen decades into the future in other parts of the world, or that's going to drown polar bears,” Lee says, “and British Columbia, along with everywhere else in the world, really needs to rapidly change to shift off of fossil fuels so that we can reduce the tendency of these things to get worse and worse over time.”
Lee and Parfitt talked to people on the front lines of extreme weather in 2021.
Among them was a farmer in Dawson Creek unable to salvage his crop as “the berries just cooked” in the field, and another in the Fraser Valley who laid off 45 farm workers and only kept the finance person to ensure bills got paid.
Some scientists conclude changes to the jet stream from the continued heating of the region around the North Pole will lead to more extreme weather.
The jet stream crosses the northern hemisphere from west to east, powered by the earth’s rotation and influenced by the temperature differences between the arctic and more southerly latitudes.
When that west-to-east flow becomes disrupted, the jet stream develops extreme waves, with regions of intense high pressure, or heat waves, building up behind those waves. If they remain in place long, a heat dome becomes more likely.
The more the circulation of air high above the Northern Hemisphere, stirred by the jet stream, changes during summer, the longer the heat waves will become, and their intensity will increase.
Keeping the refinery flares glowing is turning up the planetary heat; the consequences will be far-reaching.