Chair of ASP’s Business Council, Dante Disparte, In Huffington Post on the need to address our “changed climate”
On October 12th, 2017, Chair of ASP’s Business Council, Dante Disparte, authored an article for the Huffington Post outlining how the increasing frequency of extreme weather events suggests “that the climate is not changing,” but that it has already changed and our society must now come to grips with this reality and begin to respond accordingly. In the article, he discusses recent climate catastrophes, and how the financial calculus must change in risk bearing industries so that model error, which under capitalizes catastrophic losses and causes cost-prohibitive solutions to natural disasters, can be rectified. Without proper financial protection from disasters the federal government is often stuck with the bill. The human and natural cost of these disasters also continues to grow and reinforces the need to “build back better with resilience at the design level,” or in certain cases where the vulnerability is too great, not to build back at all.
Disparte also argues that the human toll in recent disasters, such as the effects of Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico, is partially due to insufficient preparation and response. As a result, massive disaster displacement is taking place that will change “the cultural and economic character of stricken communities,” and place additional pressure on regional actors to absorb the flood of environmental refugees. He finds that, in the face of mounting disasters, “climate change can no longer be ignored.” And, argues that our profit motive may need to find equilibrium with nature if human beings want to achieve a sustainable habitation of this planet. We must learn to adjust “from a position of conflict with nature to co-movement,” which will require substantial “change at all levels of human adaptation.” He concludes that climate change is one of the most challenging threats to humanity that it has ever faced but that it may also be one of our greatest opportunities if we approach the threat head on.
Read “Climate Changed” in its entirety in the Huffington Post.
