Philadelphia Insurance Companies: Powering the Green Revolution
Businesses across the board are embracing the green transformation, recognizing the shift towards environmentally sustainable energy sources. This transition involves moving away from traditional fossil fuels like petroleum and coal, toward alternative energy solutions such as solar, wind, and geothermal. Philadelphia Insurance Companies (PHLY) is at the forefront of this movement, providing expert environmental underwriting support for companies navigating this change.
Jamie Langes, Vice President of Environmental Underwriting at PHLY, highlights the critical role insurance plays. “Insurance can champion this repositioning by supplying financial support needed to companies engaged in green transformation through policies and programs.”
This shift represents a significant growth area, with insurance companies increasingly eager to support clients and unlock capital for green initiatives.
Why the Growing Interest in Green Energy?
Companies are drawn to green and alternative energy solutions for various reasons, prominently including sustainability goals and the pursuit of profitability. Insurance companies are also keenly observing this shift. “In the insurance sphere as a whole, carriers are actively engaged in identifying strategies to deploy their capacity and making conscious determinations regarding coverage offerings that as a marketplace, we have committed to allot to green transformation,” says Langes.
Green energy provides a renewable source of power that is critical to businesses’ future. As interest grows in solar, wind, and geothermal solutions, financial support for these projects increases in tandem.
“The more companies dive into green transformation, and the more insurers support those operations fiscally, we’re projecting this could easily set a market pace in the billions in a very short time,” notes Langes.
How Insurance is Supporting the Transition
Entering the green energy market requires significant planning. That’s why partnering with an environmental underwriting team that understands the nuances of this transition is vital. Businesses adopting alternative energy sources need insurance to secure liability transfer and to minimize escalating risks, as the market evolves.
“Insurance capacity is growing, with rates that support new ventures with a balance of coverage and premium,” Langes says.
Insurance provides a risk management perspective to help sustain start-up costs and liability exposures. Having the expertise of an experienced underwriting team can differentiate between strong risk management and a successful launch versus failure.
“Green transformation is being leveraged as one component of our environmental approach,” Langes explains, adding that PHLY’s “expertise and experience…is finding new ways to do business—including collaboration and a long-term vision, which embraces our role as a financial vehicle for progressing and assisting green transformation and technology through insurance.”
Balancing Traditional and Alternative
A key aspect of effective underwriting is the process of navigating transitional energy realities. Underwriters have a wealth of historical data to drive decision-making regarding traditional energy sources. “The insurance marketplace has ample actuarial data to gauge pricing parameters and risk acceptance vehicles from insuring traditional sources of energy long-term. As a result, insurers understand how to write that risk explicitly to make sure they’re able to not only support the business but also have the profitability to support their insureds should there be a claims situation,” explains Langes.
In contrast to traditional energy the green energy sector is still relatively new from an insurance perspective. “Green energy and design risks don’t have that much value proposition data yet since these exposures are still relatively new in the insurance marketplace as an insurable risk.”
Underwriters must stay informed to address both traditional and alternative energy needs. That includes careful review of rates, coverage options and availability, along with terms and conditions.
“The businesses have to coexist. Existing traditional energy sourcing companies that are investing in green solar, wind or geothermal will still have their original exposures; just less over time,” Langes explains. “The underwriting challenge, therefore, is that we must underwrite the two dichotomies, green transformation along with traditional, as companies transition forward.”
PHLY’s Environmental Underwriting Experts
Insurance thrives on the insurer’s profound knowledge of the insured’s risk management needs. PHLY focuses on developing an in-depth understanding of its client partners’ operations.
Companies seeking to capitalize on the green transformation can rely on PHLY’s environmental underwriting team to deliver this same level of understanding. “We’re proactive in our approach, more than reactive,” Langes continues. “This means that what’s next, what’s new, what our insureds’ needs are, remains at the forefront of our decision making.”
PHLY, as part of the Tokio Marine Group, leverages its parent company’s experts to navigate the changing societal and community interest in green transformation while focusing on what clients are looking for in their financial insurance partners.
PHLY has built an environmental underwriting team that reflects experience and marketplace expertise. “We not only have the experience but also the expertise,” notes Langes. “Many of our underwriters come from the consulting field, so they also understand the technical aspects of sustainable energy solutions. We leverage that into collaboration, and towards being a resource for brokers to help them support their clients for insurance. Tokio Marine and PHLY bring all of that expertise to the table on products and service.”
This commitment has enabled PHLY to offer both competitive and tailored coverage. Underwriters remain attentive to companies’ transitions, and have an eye on the latest developments in related fields to consistently stay abreast of changing conditions.
