Kettletown Road in Southbury was damaged by flooding from Sunday, Aug. 18, 2024’s rainstorm. At a time when billion-dollar weather events around the state and country are steadily increasing, a new panel of experts in climate policy, finance, consumer advocacy, construction and insurance has started its work in creating statewide policies for resiliency. Jeffrey Czajkowski, director of the Center for Insurance Policy and Research , and the research director of the National Association of Insurance Commissioners , said that by November, the economic impacts of severe weather events this year reached nearly $62 billion nationally, including 24 separate billion-dollar weather events. “It’s impacting a pretty wide swath of the country,” Czajkowski told the new Severe Weather Mitigation and Resiliency Advisory Council. “The costs include physical damage to residential, commercial, municipal structures and infrastructure as well as business disruptions. This is really the way the insurance industry thinks about and views these losses.” Nationally, such severe, billion-dollar events averaged slightly more than three per year in the 1980s, compared to an average of 22 events in each of the last three years. Over the last 44 years, the economic damages have totaled about $44 trillion, adjusted for inflation, including about $150 billion over the last three years, Czajkowski said. Since 1980, fatalities nationwide have totaled 16,768. More For You Climate change affects in Connecticut prompt closer look at resilience policy Why Connecticut grocery stores can sell beer but not wine and spirits Gampel Pavilion, Rentschler Field set for improvements after funding approval Nearly 8,000 workers in CT could lose paychecks if federal government shuts down Connecticut is taking a pass on new offshore wind power projects, for now “Connecticut is no stranger to these events,” he said, adding that $43 billion events occurred in the state between 1980 and 2023. […]