By Tim Quinson
Bloomberg -- Credit risks keep creeping higher for the world’s biggest polluters. (click here)
In fact, the companies facing perhaps the largest climate crisis-related losses have more than twice as much rated debt as they did when the Paris Agreement was announced almost seven years ago, according to an analysis by Moody’s Investors Service.
To be more specific, the 16 industries considered to have “very high” or “high” environmental credit risks have about $4.3 trillion of rated debt (roughly equal to Germany’s gross domestic product), up from $2 trillion in November 2015, Moody’s reported. That equals about 5.1% of total debt outstanding, up from 3% in 2015.
Whether this upward trend continues “largely depends upon the direction of environmental regulations, policy and corporate actions,” said Ram Sri-Saravanapavaan, senior analyst and lead author of the report.
Last week, (click here) our team at NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) released the final update to its 2021 Billion-dollar disaster report (www.ncdc.noaa.gov/billions), confirming what much of the nation experienced throughout 2021: another year of frequent and costly extremes. The year came in second to 2020 in terms of number of disasters (20 versus 22) and third in total costs (behind 2017 and 2005), with a price tag of $145 billion.
Bloomberg -- Credit risks keep creeping higher for the world’s biggest polluters. (click here)
In fact, the companies facing perhaps the largest climate crisis-related losses have more than twice as much rated debt as they did when the Paris Agreement was announced almost seven years ago, according to an analysis by Moody’s Investors Service.
To be more specific, the 16 industries considered to have “very high” or “high” environmental credit risks have about $4.3 trillion of rated debt (roughly equal to Germany’s gross domestic product), up from $2 trillion in November 2015, Moody’s reported. That equals about 5.1% of total debt outstanding, up from 3% in 2015.
Whether this upward trend continues “largely depends upon the direction of environmental regulations, policy and corporate actions,” said Ram Sri-Saravanapavaan, senior analyst and lead author of the report.
That is a misstatement.
By allowing companies to pollute to continue to make profits means the profit is paid for by American taxpayers carrying the burden for climate catastrophes and that doesn't begin to measure climate deaths.
The loss of a mother, father, child or grandparent, friendly neighbors is never measured in dollars. Entire communities have met with devastating climate disasters and the loss of a community goes far beyond understanding individual deaths due to climate.
The USA EPA, Department of Agriculture, Interior and Energy are only a few agencies involved in climate disasters. Include in the international realm, Departments of State and USAID. The Russian wars now on three fronts are absolutely climate disasters, but, the USA is the one country that can still produce large amounts of grains and foods in Southern California that might be the one true source of sustenance for our allies.
When politicians want to play with government laws and protecting cronys and their profits, it is more than corruption, it is a threat to the lives of Americans as well as our allies. There is no room for pollution anymore and any politician that sees it differently does not care about the COST of these disasters or the LIVES lost because of them. We don't need corruption, we need legislators with a conscience willing to protect the American people and bring down the enormous toll on land and air.
We cannot go on forever with escalating climate disaster costs.
The numbers are consistent with the amount of funds that banks have served up for fossil-fuel producers via bond sales and loans. Since the start of 2016, banks have arranged about $4.5 trillion of financing for oil, gas and coal companies, data compiled by Bloomberg show.
Companies most susceptible to credit risks are those involved in the coal, chemicals, mining, and oil and gas industries, according to Moody’s. To put that in perspective, only coal mining and coal terminal operators were seen by the firm’s analysts as having “very high” environmental credit risks as recently as 2020....
There is not one area of the USA that hasn't faced climate disasters in 2021. In the Northern Great Plains of the USA it appears on the map to be free of trouble. They had livestock losses and hardships of heat and drought.
By Annie Gowen
McCook, Neb. — As the sun rose on another hot day, (click here) rancher Brad Randel rode through his feedlot working at a grim task — culling cattle from his herd because his ranch’s sparse grass can’t sustain them during a crushing drought.
As Randel swung his quarter horse Bay Belle in tight circles, he and a ranch hand separated runty Black Angus heifers to be sold at a livestock auction from the more promising stock. The cows bellowed as the temperature began its climb into the high 90s, the remnants of a late-summer heat wave that blasted the American West with furnacelike temperatures....
No one, except the Dept. of Agriculture and Farm Bureau cares about these losses. They could mean more loan availability. Wall Street just sees it as a fluctuating price for commodities.
The climate crisis must end. It is just too bad that Big Oil lived past 2005 when the peak of their production occurred. Big Oil never dies, it just seeks political power to ensure their subsidies. These ranchers don't receive guaranteed federal subsidies year after year.
End the climate crisis now.
That should be a priority of any US Congress.
