Northland coastal property owners need not panic at the thought of their homes being left uninsurable in the face of a climate change, the Insurance Council of New Zealand says.
In its just-released its report, the United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has painted dire predictions of the effects of
global warming on Northland, particularly in coastal areas.
It says Northland can expect less rain, more severe flooding and storms and rising tides. The report also says coastal development along Northland's east coast will be at risk from the rising tides - up by 70mm - by 2050.
Insurance Council of NZ chief executive Chris Ryan said coastal property owners should not panic into believing this would leave their homes uninsurable.
"From what the report says, climate change won't have an immediate effect on people's properties and has indicated that changes will start happening over 20 years and more," Mr Ryan said.
"Understandably, individual properties that are particularly at risk may have increases in their insurance premiums, but not right across the region and 99.9 percent of properties won't be affected at all."
However, he said, if the climate-change predictions panned out as highlighted in the report, it was logical that some coastal properties might not be able to get insurance cover for a particular event.
"They may find that they cannot get insurance for a particular thing, such as flooding or, if they are close to the sea, inundation from the tide, but I don't think it will get to the stage where coastal properties will be uninsurable," Mr Ryan said.
"That's the last thing the insurance industry would want to happen. If we did that we wouldn't have a business. It would just be for say one particular risk like flooding, but they would have cover for everything else.
"Really this (report) is more of a wake-up call and people shouldn't be too alarmed about it at this stage, so don't panic.
"And the reality is that the vast majority of properties will be fine," he said.
* UN report's predictions for Northland:
• Less rain, with droughts in the east.
• More severe storms and flooding by 2050.
• Rising sea levels and increased erosion put coastal developments at risk.
• Good news for apple growers, bad news for kiwifruit orchardists.
• Salmonella and Dengue fever flourish in parts of the North Island.
• Insurance costs rise.
