Planet Money
00:28:51 · Ann Cope, Alexi Horowitz-Ghazi, S0
[00:28:51] S1: Hurricane Sally comes across right in the same area where all of this fortified development had occurred, and the IBHS fortified roofs were the ones that were in great shape. People were still in their homes. Neighbors who did not have a fortified roof had tarps, had damage, had water, and the fortified roofs were the ones that kept the community together. It's a triple win. [00:29:17] S2: A triple win, Ann says, because a roof with less damage means less disruption for an individual homeowner, more people are able to stay in the community after a major storm, and less damages for the insurance companies to pay out. As for what homeowners can do to defend their homes against wildfire, that gets us back to the experiment I'd come to the destruction lab to witness, what I like to call Exodus three four or the experiment of the burning bushes. Shareenie Munroy is the wildfire researcher charged with executing that experiment. [00:29:48] S0: We have been doing this many times, maybe 50 so far. We have another 50 to go, at least. [00:29:56] S2: How many bushes have to die before you're satisfied? [00:29:59] S0: Oh, it's what we have to pay to understand how these things behave. Right?
00:30:04 · Alexi Horowitz-Ghazi
[00:30:04] S2: It's through research like this that the industry, along with communities around the country, have settled on the idea that one of the single most important ways of hardening a home against the threat of wildfire is by limiting the flammable material within five feet of the house, creating a sort of defensive perimeter. And this particular defensive technique is now even being mandated for millions of people. Individual towns and counties, even the state of California, have adopted this idea into their building codes. And some insurance companies have made it a requirement in order to qualify for coverage. IBHS has a whole list of other recommendations for homeowners living in places with a high risk for wildfires. Homeowners can limit embers sneaking into their attic and lighting the house on fire by replacing their vents or adding much smaller metal mesh. They've also found that wooden fences can act sort of like a wick in a wildfire, spreading the blaze from home to home in a neighborhood. So swapping wood fences out for metal ones can make it less likely the fire will spread. Unfortunately, the scientific consensus here is that in order to significantly reduce a home's risk of burning down, you really should do all of this stuff, which is something a lot of people simply can't afford to do. Now, IBHS is trying to incentivize homeowners to do everything by offering a certification called wildfire prepared. When a homeowner gets that certification, it should, in theory, signal to insurers how much work they've put into mitigating potential losses, And ideally, it might translate to lower premiums. But I've been reporting on the world of wildfire and insurance for a few months now and talked to a lot of homeowners dealing with this issue in California, which is facing some of the most extreme and expensive wildfire risk. And I found that some communities that are trying to follow IBHS's new building standards to the letter of the law are still struggling with skyrocketing insurance premiums. Some homeowners have seen price increases of almost a thousand percent, or they've gotten dropped from their insurance altogether. I ask IBHS's Ann Cope about this. How do
00:32:02 · S0, Julie Rochman, Ann Cope, Alexi Horowitz-Ghazi
[00:32:02] S0: we make sense of that problem of, like, that somebody could be doing everything they possibly could to try to use IBHS science to kind of recreate their homes and still not be finding a reasonable place in the insurance market? [00:32:17] S4: So [00:32:22] S1: there are multiple pieces to to all of that. Individual properties one by one are are part of the complicated macro scale. [00:32:35] S2: Ann says it's important to understand the physical risks of any given property are only one part of the multidimensional puzzle that goes into someone's individual insurability. There's also the question of what the neighbors have or haven't done to mitigate the risk of wildfire. Stopping the spread of fire is a collective action problem. Because if the neighbors don't harden their homes, those homes can still pose a big threat to yours. And there are market issues, like whether a given insurer is overexposed because it's covering too many homes in one geographic area at risk of burning down all at once. Ann says IBHS can't solve all those issues. [00:33:14] S1: Others are gonna be able to talk about the the economic impacts and the geographic impacts, and we're just gonna keep bringing the best possible credible science to say, to make the resilience of this structure high, here's what you need to do.
00:33:14 · Ann Cope, Alexi Horowitz-Ghazi
[00:33:14] S1: Others are gonna be able to talk about the the economic impacts and the geographic impacts, and we're just gonna keep bringing the best possible credible science to say, to make the resilience of this structure high, here's what you need to do. [00:33:32] S2: Ann says it's IBHS's job to help build the scientific research for everybody else to act on. And the fact that catastrophic mega fire might be breaking the insurance market itself, that is a problem that goes way beyond the destruction lab. It's a problem playing out in forests and communities all across the country. Next week on the show, Planet Money goes to perhaps the most buyer conscious town in America to see how the insurance market has broken down and how the people there are trying to build it back up. If you want more on how economic shapes the world around you, sign up for the Planet Money newsletter. Sometimes it's an original essay or an interview or a curated digest of recent econ papers we liked. Our newsletter writer, Greg Rosolsky, puts his heart and his giant brain into it every week. We see you, Greg. Sign up at npr.org slash Planet Money newsletter or click the link in the show notes. And if you already subscribe and like it, hit reply and let Greg know what you think. This episode was produced by Vito Emanuel and edited by Jess Jiang. It was engineered by Annlie Huang and Travis Hagan and fact checked by Sierra Juarez with help from Emma Peaslee. Alex Goldmark is our executive producer. I'm Alexey Horowitz Gazi. This is NPR. Thanks for listening.
00:33:32 · Alexi Horowitz-Ghazi, S3
[00:33:32] S2: Ann says it's IBHS's job to help build the scientific research for everybody else to act on. And the fact that catastrophic mega fire might be breaking the insurance market itself, that is a problem that goes way beyond the destruction lab. It's a problem playing out in forests and communities all across the country. Next week on the show, Planet Money goes to perhaps the most buyer conscious town in America to see how the insurance market has broken down and how the people there are trying to build it back up. If you want more on how economic shapes the world around you, sign up for the Planet Money newsletter. Sometimes it's an original essay or an interview or a curated digest of recent econ papers we liked. Our newsletter writer, Greg Rosolsky, puts his heart and his giant brain into it every week. We see you, Greg. Sign up at npr.org slash Planet Money newsletter or click the link in the show notes. And if you already subscribe and like it, hit reply and let Greg know what you think. This episode was produced by Vito Emanuel and edited by Jess Jiang. It was engineered by Annlie Huang and Travis Hagan and fact checked by Sierra Juarez with help from Emma Peaslee. Alex Goldmark is our executive producer. I'm Alexey Horowitz Gazi. This is NPR. Thanks for listening. [00:35:06] S3: Stay tuned for the following announcements and messages from our sponsors.
00:35:06 · S3, S6
[00:35:06] S3: Stay tuned for the following announcements and messages from our sponsors. [00:35:10] S6: On the latest episode of sources and methods, a blue tsunami, earthquake, avalanche, democrats swept the midterms. What does this mean for president Trump's ambitions overseas? And why is Iran paying such close attention to the change up on Capitol Hill? Listen this week to sources and methods, the national security podcast from NPR. [00:35:34] S3: A beautifully designed Squarespace website is the difference between thinking about photography school and selling your portraits online. It's the difference between giving away those cookies you just made for free and running your cookie empire. A beautifully designed Squarespace website is the difference between having a movie reviewing hobby and a movie reviewing career. Squarespace, because no matter what you're into, a website makes it real. Use offer code difference for 50% off select plans. Terms and conditions apply.