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4/8/2026
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Op-Ed: When home insurance companies profit off pollution, Rhode Islanders are the ones who pay
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By Rep. Jennifer Boylan and Sen. Dawn Euer
Rhode Island is facing a home insurance crisis. Premiums are skyrocketing, and many people can’t get insurance at all. Companies are canceling policies, issuing blanket refusals to renew policies and in some cases leaving the state entirely.
The cause of this crisis isn’t mysterious: both nationally and locally, climate change is spiking premiums and non-renewal rates.
Here in Rhode Island, the impacts of climate change are accelerating. The 2023 brush fire in Exeter was the state’s largest wildfire since 1942. Intense storms are battering our coasts with flooding, erosion and wind damage and rising sea levels threaten the coastal homes that manage to survive the storms. Increasingly frequent and severe climate disasters mean greater damage and higher insurance claims. To stay profitable, insurers are passing these costs on to customers through higher premiums or by leaving the market.
But insurance companies aren’t victims: they are actively fueling this crisis by financing and providing insurance coverage for the fossil fuel corporations, who are the primary drivers of climate change.
The scale is significant: US insurers are invested in fossil fuels to the tune of over half a trillion dollars.
When our home insurance premiums rise rapidly or we lose coverage entirely, we are the ones who pay the cost of these investments.
It’s unacceptable for insurance companies to claim that the conditions that they are helping to create are too risky to insure under, especially when property casualty insurers made a record profit of $169 billion in 2024.
This is why we have introduced the Rhode Island Insurance Market Protection Act (2026-H 8219, 2026-S 2646) to protect Rhode Island homeowners and stop insurance companies from profiting off pollution.
The act would prevent insurance companies from investing in new fossil fuel projects and phase out their coverage and investment in existing projects by 2035. Companies would need to show their compliance through annual reports or risk losing their state license.
It would also impose penalties and restrictions on companies that do not comply or attempt to abandon Rhode Islanders to avoid scaling back their investments in, and insurance of, the fossil fuel companies and projects driving the climate crisis.
Insurance companies can afford this. Passing the costs of climate disasters on to their customers through higher and higher premiums is not a sustainable business model. Homeowners can’t afford it, and state regulators and legislators won’t stand for it.
Addressing the climate crisis is essential for the economic wellbeing of Rhode Island households as well as the insurance industry. This act pushes insurers to accept this reality.
To keep Rhode Island livable, fossil fuel emissions must drop significantly and property insurance rates need to stabilize. Neither will happen if big insurance companies continue to fund oil and gas projects that fuel global warming and climate disasters that follow.
Rep. Jennifer Boylan (D-Dist. 66, Barrington, East Providence) and Sen. Dawn Euer (D-Dist. 13, Newport, Jamestown) serve in the Rhode Island General Assembly.
For more information, contact:
Tristan Grau, Publicist
State House Room B20
Providence, RI 02903
401.222.4935
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