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In this episode, Mike Smith and Nick Gardner discuss the intersection of climate change, policy, and insurance.
First, Mike highlights the concept of tipping points and the importance of staying below certain temperature thresholds to avoid irreversible climate events. He also discusses the climate positions of the vice presidential candidates and the role of insurance in addressing climate risks.
Next, Nick Gardner explains how insurance companies have the power to influence the transition to a more sustainable future and the need for aligning insurance with climate goals. Premiums for the Planet is a movement that aims to drive change in the insurance industry by pressuring insurance carriers to adopt sustainable practices. The movement is focused on collective action and collaboration among businesses to drive systemic change.
00:00 Introduction and Overview
01:45 JD Vance: Changing Stance on Climate
03:31 Tim Walz: Strong Climate Record
03:59 Endorsements from Climate Experts
04:31 The Intersection of Policy and Science: Tipping Points
07:53 Probabilities and Risk: The Role of Insurance
08:59 The Rising Cost of Insurance Premiums
09:57 Undervalued Properties and Climate Risk
10:33 The Impact on Housing Markets
11:03 Taking Action to Reduce Tipping Point Risk
Mike Smith (00:00)
Hey everyone, welcome back to The Climate Dad, where we talk about and explain the news and science of climate change. I'm your host, Mike Smith. I'm a father of two great kids, and I'm also the founder of Aclymate where we help businesses measure, reduce, report, and offset their footprint for an affordable price, and without having to become a climate expert. Today, we'll once again be talking about the climate consequences of our upcoming national election, now that we have the two vice presidential candidates. We'll talk a little bit about climate tipping points, statistical odds, and the risks we'll each have to deal with in our changing climate world.
I'm also going to be joined by my friend Nick Gardner from Premiums for the Planet. He's a central player in a really innovative organization that can both save you money and your business help make an impact on your climate footprint. Stick around.
So unless you've been living under a rock, you know that we're approaching two months to a presidential election. A lot has changed in the past few weeks. One of those things is that both legitimate candidates have selected their vice presidential running mates. For Trump, it's the first term Ohio Senator JD Vance, and for Vice President Harris, it's Minnesota Governor Tim Walz. As listeners know, I'm a Navy veteran.
I flew F -18s for the Navy for about a dozen years active duty before I transitioned into the Navy Reserve for another eight. I ultimately retired after a combined 20 years. So I think it's interesting that the two candidates are both veterans. Vance did a single enlistment in the U .S. Marine Corps and Tim Walz ultimately retired after 24 years of service in the Nebraska and Minnesota National Guard. More than most candidates, I feel like I know these guys, even though I've actually never met either one.
Anyway, now I'm a climate guy, so I of course wanted to see what they had done on climate. And after a little research, I thought it would be good to share it with you all. Let's start with JD Vance. Senator Vance's biography is pretty well known for those that are big readers. His book, Hillbilly Elegy, came out a few years ago to pretty broad acclaim. If you don't know, the book talks about how he was raised in a broken home dealing with drug issues in Ohio. He ultimately joined the US Marine Corps.
as I previously mentioned, and then attended the Ohio State University and Yale Law School before going into venture capital. In that capacity, he was a marginally positive actor in climate that many people might be surprised to know. He invested in a few climate tech startups and spoke about the need to switch away from fossil fuels. However, when he decided to run for Senate in 2022, he took money from some pretty anti -climate folks and that kind of changed his tune.
He's now an advocate for the expansion of fossil fuel usage. He even introduced a bill to repeal the EV tax credit and instead give those tax credits to fossil fuel operated vehicles. The Trump policy, which he supports, includes phrases like drill baby drill. So I could dig in a bit, but I think you get the idea further and be really blunt. There's no pathway to our climate future with Trump and Vance.
On the other hand, Governor Waltz's background includes time as a factory worker, middle school teacher and football coach. He was an enlisted artilleryman in the National Guard. And then he ended up doing a, was a five -time representative in a very rural district in southern Minnesota before becoming governor. As governor, Tim Waltz has passed over 40 different climate laws, including mandating a zero carbon electricity power by 2040.
adoption of increased fuel efficiency standards, accelerating the permitting of renewable energy sites, and expanding the training of clean energy workforce development. Interestingly, of all the candidates for selection to the Harris ticket that were in contention on that short list, he has the strongest climate record. According to Jamie Henn of Fossil Free Media, Walz is the climate candidate. And then former EPA Administrator, National Climate Advisor, and just
all around climate badass, Gina McCarthy says she's quote, all in for Waltz, end quote. And that she believes specifically that quote, he cannot be bought by the fossil fuel industry, end quote. This would seem to be a signal for how a Harris administration would prioritize the issue. And let's hope they do since climate is one of the few issues that voters of both sides can agree is urgent. In my opinion, if you care about the climate, the choice really couldn't be clearer.
Mike Smith (04:32)
Okay, so let's move from politics and into the intersection of policy and science. Very specifically, let's talk about tipping points. One of the things that I think that was so important about the Paris Climate Accords in 2015 was that it took what the scientists were talking about and converting them into policy goals. Specifically, it said that we should all endeavor to remain below 1 .5 degrees Celsius of warming and we must absolutely stay below two degrees. Well, where'd they come up with those numbers? It has to do with something known as tipping points.
These are events that will happen in the natural world, and once we pass them, we cannot go back. Our world will have been permanently changed. They include things like melting ice sheets, methane release from loss of permafrost, dying coral reefs around the globe, and the changing of ocean currents. The thing is this, scientists don't really know what level of heat will cause these events to happen, because the Earth is a complex multivariable system.
the that scientists can come up with are probabilities of when these events will happen. So when the goals of one and a half and two degrees C were created, they were effectively formed by scientific best guesses. And the scary thing is we're now well past the point of zero probability for most of these events. Like we cannot guarantee that they will not happen. We just, we're gonna find out. So for example, even if we stopped emitting right now, there's a chance that we've already bought some of these outcomes.
And that really comes down to a discussion of probabilities and chance. To truly eliminate chance tends to be very expensive. I was trained as an engineer, and so sometimes I think about this like the way an engineer would. For example, the levees around New Orleans are built post -Katrina to a 100 -year storm probability, which is to say that every year there's a 1 % chance that a storm will be stronger than what the levees were designed for.
But there's a couple of things kind of embedded in that statement and that we assume when we say it. The first is that we as a country have accepted that New Orleans will probably have catastrophic deadly flooding like it experienced with Katrina far sooner than you might guess. How many years would it take for a 50 % probability of occurrence to stack up? It's not 100 years. It's not even 50 years. It's actually 41 years. If you have a 1 % chance of it happening every year,
then after 41 years you'll have accumulated a 50 % total likelihood. Think about it this way, are you okay with losing New Orleans again in our lifetimes?
The other thing about a 1 % likelihood is that it's based upon our climate history, not our climate future. In a warming world, the 1 % that undergirds assumptions around climate is probably not correct. And if that changes, let's conservatively say that 1 in 100 year storm is now a 1 in 50 year storm, that changes the annual odds to 2 % that'll happen every year. Well, now we're talking about a 50 % likelihood of an New Orleans Destroying storm occurring in the next 21 years.
So that's how odds work. And every step we take closer towards the median point of likelihood doesn't just increase our chances of hitting it, it actually accelerates it. And once those tipping points, both global and more local, are crossed, we won't be going back.
Do know who's really in tune with probabilities and risk? Insurance. It's like their whole business. And like any business, they're around to make money. So the best way to do that is to insure those who have low probabilities of loss and charge them a reasonable rate to cover their risks. When a location starts seeing evidence of higher risk, then insurance companies can pretty drastically raise their rates. It's the way that they make money, of course, or they can stop providing the insurance in those risky areas. Now a friend of mine asked, like,
Aren't you concerned Florida will be submerged from climate change? And my answer of course was not really. Isn't that really the goal?
Of that was just The Climate Dad joke of the week here. But in all seriousness, the good people of Florida are having to deal with their insurance becoming unaffordable or even outright disappearing. It's a little tipping point all on its own. Nationwide, these increased premiums affect about 6 .8 million homes. But again, that's based upon historical trends. A study by the First Street Foundation estimates that 39 million properties nationwide are overvalued because of underpriced insurance.
If you think about how much your insurance is going to cost, you're to have to figure out what you'd be willing to spend for a property. And that's what they mean by undervalued. A different study in Nature Climate Change puts the overvaluing of property around the country at somewhere between 121 billion and $237 billion. So even the people who are good at risk analysis are probably underestimating our current climate risk. This is going to have a whole bunch of tumbledown effects.
What happens to housing markets when this risk gets priced in? What happens when a home becomes uninsurable? An asset that someone once thought was a store of wealth becomes a nearly worthless one without even having to have gone through a hurricane or fire. It's the insurance or the lack thereof that makes the asset worthless, not the event that the insurance is trying to prevent you from. It's kind of an odd and unintentional lever that insurance might be what causes Floridians to actually start caring more appropriately about climate. But here we are.
Maybe we'll have a tipping a point in opinions.
All right, before we get on to today's guest, a couple of things I have to ask from you. One, if you're learning from or appreciate what you're hearing here on The Climate Dad, do me a solid right now and go to your podcast app and please like, rate, review, share it, do all the things. It costs you nothing but maybe 30 seconds and it'll help me keep growing my audience and help us to get the message a little further. And then number two, if you're ready to be part of what reduces our risk of hitting climate tipping points, the power is in your hands.
We'd love to help you over here at Aclymate where we have the easiest, most affordable climate solution for your business. We'll show you ways to reduce your carbon footprint and get you on the path to net zero. It'll help you win new customers and keep your most valuable ones, attract and retain the talent you need from the rising climate generation. And our green business certification program will help you to show your climate bona fides and win certifications with B Corp, EcoVadis, Green Business Benchmark, CDP, and a whole host more. Our smallest customers can even start it for as low as $10 per month.
It's about as easy as it gets. Now it's time to meet with today's guest, Nick Gardner at Premiums for the Planet. We'll talk all about risk, climate, and how you can save both, save money on insurance and make an impact on climate.
Mike Smith (11:21)
All right, everybody, I'm here joined today by my friend, Nick Gardner, who is the head of partnerships and community development for Premiums for the Planet. Premiums for the Planet is really innovative in the insurance space about helping to identify concerns around climate and insurance. I'll obviously let Nick talk more about that, but Nick, thanks for joining us here on The Climate Dad.
Nick Gardner (11:42)
Yeah, Mike, it's great to be on. I wish we were doing it in person over a coffee or beer, but really grateful for the opportunity and good to see you.
Mike Smith (11:50)
Yeah, it's good to see you, man. So yeah, I want you to tell the folks at home, you know, what's your background, how you got into this.
Nick Gardner (11:57)
Sure. So I currently live in Seattle, Washington, but grew up in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. And I grew up luckily with two awesome parents. My dad was very focused on the outdoors, kind of localized conservation efforts in New Hampshire. And my mom was very much on the social side, working with kids from a lot of different backgrounds, helping them navigate all sorts of life circumstances. And so I think from an early age, I was really exposed to impact.
and impact both at the community level, but how you can really use your opportunity to drive change. And so from that, I've always had my eyes and ears opened for those opportunities to align my own skill sets and careers. But didn't go that way originally, actually. Like most kids who don't know what they want to do, went to business school for college. The school that I went to is very focused on going into accounting or investment banking, which actually turned me off to business.
right out of the gates. And so I spent a lot of my early career, but college years really figuring out what I didn't like versus what I like to do. And through HappenChance stumbled into an organization called Salesforce, which I found them based on their one -one -one model, which ultimately they donate 1 % of their time, technology, and people back to the greater good every year. And so it was kind of my second layer of looking at impact and how you can align.
a career in business to it and spent a number of years there working on market development teams that ultimately coincided with me helping lead a lot of their early stage Net Zero Cloud work, which was carbon accounting, kind of early early software development. And then from there got looped into this gig at PrettyMuchToThePlanet. Premiums for the Planet it hasn't really been a linear journey. I always kind of joke it's more of like a monkey bar approach than a traditional career ladder, but it's how we're here today. And
just feel very grateful to have had the guidance of my folks early on and then also some great mentors along the way with different roles.
Mike Smith (13:58)
I think it's kind of funny that you talk about that the accounting and the real numbers orientation of your B -school experience steered you away from business. Then you ended up in accounting for business, specifically in carbon accounting at Net Zero Cloud.
Nick Gardner (14:12)
was gonna say it's funny you mentioned that and one of the best pieces of advice I got from a mentor whose name was Patrick Flynn, who used to run sustainability for Salesforce. I actually reached out to him in my earlier days at Salesforce when I was actually working still more on the financial services side and said like, look, I would love to do anything I can to work on climate, but I don't really see a way to get there. And his advice was take what you do best right now and apply it to a cause.
you care most about. And so for me, my background was traditional business and yeah, had that accounting ecofi lens And for me, that was a way to slingshot my career into the work on climate through Salesforce. And so it's funny you caught that, that narrative there because that's ultimately the distinction that he made and the way that I tried to do it.
Mike Smith (14:57)
I know that, one of the things we talk about often on this podcast is the idea that, everything is, is connected to climate. every skillset is necessary, as we kind of move forward. And so it's interesting to see that, in advising somebody to get into that space, take your skills and go do what you can with them right now. You don't have to go learn something new necessarily.
So, okay, so you're doing Net Zero Cloud for Salesforce and what in what capacity were you working with them?
Nick Gardner (15:28)
Yeah, so the original opportunity was around like pre -distribution. So what a lot of folks didn't know at the time at Salesforce is I was working a full -time job like in the traditional financial services sector. But Patrick and another guy named Ari Alexander had given me the opportunity to lead a lot of our pre -distribution efforts to scale that product. And so Salesforce had actually built Net Zero Cloud first for their internal team to better mobilize a lot of our...
own sustainability efforts. And so for me, it was a great way to get a crash course on how Salesforce ran sustainability at scale. And then from there, I worked with Ari and some of our broader stakeholder partners to figure out how we could start to bring that product to market and other verticals. And so a lot of my early work was focused on like all things spreading sort of the knowledge of what we're up to at Salesforce internally to then flip it externally, and really be part of a lot of the go to market efforts to
build out that market category, which as you know all too well, is thriving today. And it's been really cool to see the journey of how we've went from zero to where it is now.
Mike Smith (16:33)
To maybe put a slight religious thing upon this is you were like a climate apostle out there spreading the good word, if you will. What was that experience like?
Nick Gardner (16:43)
Yeah.
It was really funny and it's, you know, it's interesting to use that language because that's kind of, I think how a lot of my friends and colleagues thought of me internally during those days is that anyone who would listen, I'd be like, look, like this is really the future of where technology is going. And if you think about Salesforce and how they have sales service marketing for traditional CRM, we were just rebranding it under the lens of technology or climate technology of scope one, scope two and scope three, carbon accounting. And so for me, I felt like.
and a preacher at times trying to get a lot of folks on board, but it was pretty challenging early. I mean, a lot of folks, there was a huge education gap, both internally at the company and externally on why this type of product matters, why it would really help accelerate a lot of different sustainability initiatives for any vertical. And so I think it's kind of similar to the place I'm in now with insurance is there's just a huge education hurdle. It has to be.
breached, but then once folks start to understand and there's a lot of awareness around it, then kind of the faucets are running and you're off to the races. And so it was really exciting to make that jump and then see sort of where it's landed since, but was definitely, yeah, a challenge in the early days for sure.
Mike Smith (17:56)
Yeah, I think for a lot of our listeners and for a lot of our customers as well, sometimes they are, they're the advocate, they're the champion inside of their company and they're having to get people on board. And so for folks that haven't thought about sustainability and about how that ties into risk, how that ties into profitability, what are some of the lessons learned you had about that?
experience, you know, about like how do you spread this word and how do you get people to, you know, to buy into what you're talking about?
Nick Gardner (18:32)
Yeah, and I think, you know, at least in the lens of the work that we're doing within insurance, it's exactly like you said, it really stems from a conversation of someone who's a champion, which typically we find, you know, either the head of sustainability or a role similar or someone focused sort of on the brand marketing side of it, who really understands the impact and values alignment component, but is struggling to bridge the gap with their CFO or head of operations or even top level executive and.
I think what it ultimately comes back to is tying it to business fundamentals. And so a lot of the times the way we think about it is how do you create a value prop that aligns to that? And so with what we build premiums to the planet, we're always looking at it from the lens of, yes, this is one of the most sustainable decisions you can make with your insurance today, but also at the same time we've built the program. So there is no additional risk. There's the same coverage or service delivered through the program, but also.
On a longer term horizon, we're driving better economics by building a better risk pool of organizations. And so why we feel that works is it allows the head of sustainability to not only go back to their CFO and say, look, this is a great brand decision. It's a great sustainability decision. But also when we look at the economics of joining, call it a risk pool of more like -minded, socially conscious and environmentally stewards of the environment, it allows us to make a better economic decision as part of that. And so.
That's not the use case every time when you're trying to make these decisions, but wherever you can find a way to tie it back to really what moves the needle for that stakeholder within your organization, it's going to just add velocity and a lot of credibility to what you're trying to bring to the table and really accelerate the gap to getting that implemented.
Mike Smith (20:16)
I think that's an important thing that we all have to continue to drive home is that so often this conversation is framed as you can either do the right thing for the business or the right thing for the environment. Like that this is a nice to have, not something that's actually like a moneymaker. And a lot of times it really is. It's a moneymaker. Even if it's not a moneymaker, it helps to build the brand in ways that will have real tangible outcomes, but in the short term, or it is maybe a little less tangible.
Nick Gardner (20:32)
Right.
Mike Smith (20:45)
But either way, this isn't just a nice to have. Doing something about climate is important for the business. Pivoting, we're talking about insurance today, man. This is why we have you on the show. And so, help to educate people that are listening along about like...
why they should think about insurance and climate. Like the dots don't necessarily, it's kind of like orange juice and toothpaste. Like they don't necessarily connect up in most people's heads.
Nick Gardner (21:17)
Yeah, no, it's true. And I think if you were to shake me awake like a year ago and tell me that I'd be working on the intersection of like insurance and climate, I would definitely, I would definitely be surprised. But so there, even the way I got into this opportunity was Patrick Flynn, who I mentioned earlier had just started talking with Brad, who's our founder, about the work that we were doing. And when I had left Salesforce, I called up Patrick to ask him really what were some big swing opportunities that he was focused on.
And he was very quick to reply, like the intersection of climate finance and, you know, a company sustainability roadmap for, program. And so it was something that I wasn't overly exposed to just as a general concept, but once I started to dig into insurance, it was kind of like one of those problems that once you, you learn about, you can't look away from. And I think what is the reality of it is like you and I, like we would rather talk about anything else in the world on a day to day basis. Right. It's like.
an industry that folks love to hate. And because of that, it's allowed it to become really entrenched and opaque in what goes on behind the scenes as it relates to environmental impact. And so when you think about what we do as a business community, every year we send trillions of dollars through our premiums out to these carriers. And those carriers ultimately have to invest that money somewhere. The reason they're doing that is they want to make enough back.
to pay out the claims, but also turn a profit. And so just like you find in banking where 90 % of our money that sits on a balance sheet is loaned out and is typically getting loaned out to fossil fuel projects, the same problem is playing out in insurance where those premiums are typically getting invested into things that might not align with a lot of your listeners' values. And so from an asset management perspective, these insurers are the second largest.
on the planet behind banks, but they also ultimately decide what to insure and not to insure in a market economy. And so when you think about the regulatory power of the industry, it's almost like they're the government, but can move at the speed of business because they ultimately decide what gets insured and not insured and that accelerates or de -accelerates certain transitions to a more regenerative or sustainable future. And a good example of that is even if you look at...
you know, crop insurance. Like it's really hard right now for regenerative farmers to get insured because the industry looks at that as a higher risk switch because of the failure rate that we've seen historically. And a lot of what insurance does is look at actuarial data. And so what we're trying to do is pretty much to the planet is create systems change within that to really harness the power that the insurance industry has into a force for good.
Mike Smith (24:03)
There's a lot to unpack on that. The first one is I love the line that insurance companies have like, like governmental powers, but can move at the speed of business. And I don't think people like fully appreciate, you know, maybe not to go like cueing on on this, but like how much power, how power is located in different systems. You know, and so like, when you talk about that, like you talk about, it brought to mind to me about like the difficulty,
in the insurance markets within Florida right now. And the reason that they're doing that is because of the uninsurability from certain climate related issues. Maybe you could talk about that a little bit more.
Nick Gardner (24:44)
Yeah, I think it's a good point and it kind of portrays the irony that exists within the industry today. Like if you think about why we're buying premiums, it's to mitigate risk of our business. We're sending those to carriers that are then investing that money in things that inherently create risk through fossil fuel production, so on and so forth, which leads to a lot of the natural disasters from climate, or sorry, from fires to...
flooding and then ultimately you're seeing the carriers then back out of those markets and deeming the state of California uninsurable. And so I think what the challenge is, is right now it's an industry that's focused very much on bottom line protection. And because of the risks that we're seeing play out due to the climate emergency, it's impacting the bottom line of these carriers. And so they're doing a lot right now to protect that balance sheet. And I think it's a very short sighted decision.
And what we're trying to create is not just the market demand, but awareness to really ask for better from the industry and really move from that single bottom line mindset to something that looks a lot more holistically at where the industry can go and helps accelerate and adopt a lot of the practices that we'd like to see as a business community. But yeah, you're absolutely right. It's, it's a little bit crazy to make your head explode looking at it when you see those, those headlines and understand just how integral they are and actually.
the role of the things that they're trying to back away from from a risk perspective.
Mike Smith (26:11)
So yeah, it brings to mind the old climate adage around adaptation or framework, I should say, of adaptation versus mitigation. Adaptation being about like changing to meet the world that is changing in front of you, mitigation being efforts to prevent the worst outcomes from coming to pass. And so you see the insurance carriers themselves adapting to increased risks, but they're not doing anything to mitigate, to prevent the risks from...
from arriving. So fascinating. Tell me more about how you do this work. Like, so you, you know, you just talked about that you have been pressuring the insurance carriers to do this, but this is not necessarily like a full divestment strategy like you might see in other spots. So, you know, talk to talk to me about like premium Premiums for the Planet 's work on this.
Nick Gardner (27:03)
Yeah, absolutely. So our work actually started with so Brad Stevenson is our CEO, and Brad from about 2018 to call it 2021 led a movement in banking first. And so I'd mentioned it earlier, but there's this thesis in banking that, you know, if you're Patagonia, and you're doing all these amazing things in your supply chain, and with your materials, but you have $50 million in the bank with JP Morgan, JP Morgan is typically lending that money out. And so what Brad
did was build a movement around bringing awareness to the fact that your banking relationships and having control over your financial supply chain really, really matters. And so that movement was successful and it helped brands like Patagonia and Cliff, you know, move hundreds of millions of dollars in bank deposits from what were considered the laggers at the time to some of the leading and emerging green banks. But what Brad found was that it's really hard to build a collective action movement in banking. It's a very one -to -one relationship.
There's a lot of red tape, a lot of cost honestly in that switch and also just a tremendous amount of operational burden. And so in order to really move at the speed and scale that he and now we wanted to, we started to look at insurance. And I had mentioned earlier, there's really those two levers that make insurance important. It's the capital allocation and kind of asset management size. And then also the ultimate decision to underwrite or not underwrite certain practices. And so.
We looked at the insurance industry and to really put it in layman terms, when you think about the value chain, there is the insured. So like there's the Patagonias of the world that need insurance. There's this weird broker drill in the middle that helps you find in place and find the different coverages that you need. And then the carriers that ultimately provide those coverages. And so what we've done is put ourselves right in the middle of that value chain. Call it an activist brokerage or a Michelin brokerage because it's a natural mechanism within the world.
of insurance that allows you to organize. And typically in today's market, brokers just organize their clients to drive better economics or policy rates. And what we're doing is the same thing, but flipping the model on its head to really drive systems change as it relates to climate and social justice outcomes. And so what we can essentially do is go to a brand like Burton, who's a member and say, for the money that you already spend on insurance,
switch it through our brokerage platform and we can immediately add mission alignment, brand value and impact at no additional cost and very light operational burden. And so what that's allowing us to do is both build the premiums under management that drives the influencing scale we need to go back to the carrier landscape and ask for better, but also brings in the brand voice of these amazing brands to tell that story and bring awareness to it. And so...
We've been really excited to see the velocity and momentum of folks coming into the movement and also from NGO partners to advisors to, you know, we call them friend lancers. There's just been a tremendous amount of help along the way. And so we're super grateful and motivated by the support we've seen, but it's a big industry and there's a lot of work to do.
Mike Smith (30:10)
Yeah. so let me understand a little bit of how this works. or repeat back to what you just said in kind of my own words, which is, so if enough of businesses come in, they don't actually switch insurance carriers. They just switch brokers, but by switching brokers, they get into kind of a sub risk pool. that, that almost gives them like voting power inside of the insurance carriers themselves.
And it does two things is one is it puts them ideally into a lower risk pool because these are people that are already doing the mitigation around climate themselves. And then two is the more people that join to this, the more voting power effectively that they have based on just the dollars that are going into these insurance carriers and that can change the behavior. It's almost like buying shares in the insurance carrier yourself.
Nick Gardner (31:05)
Yeah, it's a great, great point. And that's why we started our theory of change at the broker level, because it allows us to organize. And so as we grow in scale, what we're ultimately building is not just a community of climate conscious organizations that want better from the industry, but because they are doing a lot of different things across different, you know, call it ESG principles, they're actually a better risk profile for those carriers. And so to your question earlier about like,
you know, what is the value prop if you're someone in sustainability trying to get an initiative passed through? What we're also helping drive is better economics for our community because they are a better risk profile. They're doing a lot of different things within their supply chain or broader stakeholder ecosystem to mitigate their own risk. And so therefore should be rewarded for it in our theory of change. And it's not something that they've been rewarded for from a price perspective in the industry to date.
And then, yeah, ultimately creating like lobbying, you know, kind of dollar voting leverage within the market. And because we're the broker, it allows us to always maintain leverage within that value chain. So what we're also doing is creating the opportunity for carriers to compete based on sustainability. And so right now we work with a lot of NGOs to rate and rank the carriers that we feel are leading and lagging. And once we reach different thresholds of scale, we'll ultimately move our community to those that we feel are leading.
And what that does is it again creates that competitive, you know, nature of like saying, Hey, if I'm carrier a and I do XYZ, I have the opportunity to earn this better book of business. And if I'm not doing that, I know that that book of business is going to walk out the door to one of my competitors. And so in a lot of early conversations we've had with folks within the insurance industry, we've gotten validation on that theory of change and just are really excited now to build the scale to deliver on it.
Mike Smith (32:53)
Got it. So you can almost think of this as a climate investment, which is it will save you money, likely, not necessarily, but likely. But your impact is going to be potentially delayed. You're not going to have like that feel good moment of switching your whole book of business to like this leading insurance carrier, or at least the current leading insurance carrier from a climate perspective. But the longer term is that you're effectively joining an army.
You're going to be one soldier in an army of people that are pushing the bigger insurance carriers to start decarbonizing their investment portfolios and start thinking about mitigating their risk.
Nick Gardner (33:36)
Yeah, and that's where the term collective action really comes in. I think what we've seen both from the work in banking, but now in insurance is when you go at this alone against an industry that has the scale of banking or insurance, it's really hard to drive change. I mean, even if you're Patagonia and you're doing all these right things, your influence is a raindrop in the ocean of that entire industry. And I think when folks go at it alone, it's harder to get.
more accomplished because there's not the scale behind it, but also it opens up the opportunity for the incumbents to really kind of greenwash the situation where they say, hey, like here's our green random product policy, whatever it may be, but it really doesn't have a lot behind it. And so what we're hoping to achieve with the scale is more systemic change where it's not just a one -off for someone to keep a client happy, but really driving practice overhaul within those different organizations, but also protect our community.
from greenwashing through that. And so we've been a part of a lot of great organizations like B Lab, which is the parent company for B Corp, like we're a B Corp organization ourselves, protect our winners, 1 % for the planet, climate collaborative, where we've seen collective action succeed. And so working with those cause partners to help kind of go at it together just gives us a lot of motivation and our ability to not just deliver, but also do a lot of exciting and cool things along the way.
Mike Smith (35:00)
That's brilliant. Yeah, change happens slowly and then suddenly. And so you're in the slowly phase right now, but the suddenly is coming. Let's bring it down to, you know, from 30 ,000 feet back down to ground level here. So.
What would an individual or an organization, how would they get started on kind of this journey? Where, you know, what do they need to know? Where can they go for material, education? You know, who's their apostle?
Nick Gardner (35:31)
Yeah, no, it's a great, great question. I mean, I think the reality is, is like in 90 to 95 % of the conversations we have, like folks just generally aren't aware about the problem statement of insurance. And so whether it's coming to just chat with us, if you'd like to learn more about it, or a number of our NGO partners, some great ones are Ceres, Rocky Mountain Institute, Drawdown, Insure Our Future. They're all doing a lot of leading work. Share Actions, another one on sort of not just the rating and ranking of
carriers, but also like the state of the industry today. And so if you want to do a deep dive, which I am not sure many people do on insurance, but once you like me, I hope you find like, it's really fascinating once you take a peek under the hood. there's a lot of great material out there and if it's helpful, I'm happy to, you know, follow up with some resources you can send the, the audience after that allows them to just quickly hook into the right stuff.
Mike Smith (36:26)
Yeah, we'll include those in the show notes. In the more immediate though, one of the things I'd recommend is going to premiumsfortheplanet .com slash get dash started. And Nick and his team have a great forum there you can fill out to kind of get started. Full disclosure, Aclymate started with Premiums for the Planet just today, actually. The day of this recording, Nick put me in contact with a great broker here in Colorado.
Looking forward to switching our book of business over to them. So, so yeah, I can, I can, I can stand by, you know, that they'll, they'll hook you up with good people.
Nick Gardner (37:00)
I pretty, yeah. Yeah, we're super excited to have you on board and just for folks context without getting too much into it, it's a really straightforward process. Really the way we've built the model is to echo the points I made earlier where when we thought about movement building, there's kind of some key ingredients that have to be in there. It has to be frictionless. You can't ask folks to pay more to do the right thing.
And from an operational perspective, it has to be really straightforward. And so while we're technically a licensed broker, we've built a marketplace of brokers underneath us that allows us to go to organizations of all shapes and sizes and say, hey, for that money that you're already spending on insurance, switch it through our platform, which is done through what's called a broker record change. And once that paperwork, which is essentially two pieces of paper is finalized, you're immediately within the premiums planet community. And so.
What we're hoping to do is allow folks to really take what's been historically like an administrative cost of doing business or a grudge spend and make that quick alignment to it. And when we think about systems change within your organization in itself, we look at it as a really easy way to start that climate finance conversation. Going and changing your bank right out of the gate is super hard. Overhauling a 401k program is super hard, both incredibly important, but typically have additional costs and an operational lift to it. And so if it feels like a very daunting,
place to start when looking at your financial supply chain. We've tried to do it in a way that allows you to easily enter that conversation, get a win for your CFO, have a visible component through like what our Badge Climate Community delivers, and then you're off to the races. So yeah, we're incredibly excited to have you all on board and you know, more to come.
Mike Smith (38:46)
Yeah, excited about it as well. I mean, there's also a place on your on the form here to check for personal insurance. So this isn't just for business insurance as well.
Nick Gardner (38:55)
It is just for business today, but we're also capturing interest on the personal side. The reason we started with business is for size and scale purposes, it's a lot more approachable to go after the B2B angle from just pure resourcing. Every brand can ultimately be a center of influence and for what is a small team today, it made a lot more sense. But as we kind of build out our own resourcing capabilities and add depth to our team, we're definitely exploring that as well. And so,
If you're interested on the personal side, we'd love that data point and would say more to come there, but a little bit further out.
Mike Smith (39:30)
Gotcha. Okay. You know, let's talk a little about a few of your members. Like why, you know, if you go to your,
If you go to your website there, you know, like you do list some of your members there, Jones snowboards, protect our winners Burton snowboards. So a lot of those, those outdoor rec specifically around winter sports are highlighted kind of right up front. You know, but also like your, your B Corp, as you mentioned, you know, talk about like, as the, you know, the, the director of partnerships, like customers, partners, like how this all kind of fits together in your role within this movement.
Nick Gardner (40:10)
Sure. Yeah. So just to echo your point there, we've been incredibly fortunate to have some amazing early adopters to the program. Folks like Burton, Joan Snowboard, Nide Ecker, Outside Inc. have been really helpful for not just adding visibility to our movement, but also movement building alongside of us. And so I'd mentioned a few moments ago, the idea of brands as a point of activation. And so when we look at a company like Burton that comes on board, while it's amazing to have Burton,
share their story, they also have the opportunity to engage their stakeholder network and their supply chain and their industry peers. And Burton has been an incredible example of someone who's brought others in. And I think when we think about any, you know, climate solution we're tackling, we just need to go quicker together. And really the way that we've tried to activate and, you know, build our movement is around that collaboration amongst members and cause partners. And so,
Where we're kind of focused today just by natural proximity is looking at like outdoor lifestyle, organic food, BEV, CPG, more so because like the idea of collective action resonates more traditionally than like a transportation industry or something like that, where there's like an outsized influence of folks that are B Corps or part of 1 % of the planet or organic trade association and understand really that collective motion that can occur to shape industries. And so...
I'm really excited by some of the early adoption and looking forward to continued growth within those verticals, but also beyond as well. Because at the end of the day, everyone buys insurance. And I think ultimately, this message resonates across verticals. It's just where we've seen a lot of that catalyzation today.
Mike Smith (41:54)
Yeah, it's relationships. Everything about climate is relationships. And so we see that in the carbon accounting a lot about like how there's the business relationships that cause my scope one to be your scope three and vice versa. But also in the in kind of the relationships of businesses driving forward collectively, I think that's that's really interesting. And so rather than seeing them as customers, you're seeing them as partners of a movement moving forward together.
like, could you maybe tell me some stories? Tell me a story about one of your members and maybe one of your partners that you think that has really helped to move it forward, people that are thinking innovatively and creatively about how to do this.
Nick Gardner (42:37)
Yeah, so a good example on the partnership side would be B Lab. B Lab is the parent organization that oversees all B Corps. And if you think about why B Lab and B Corp exists, it's really to drive collective action for businesses that want to be a force for good. And so when you go through that certification process, you're looking at every single angle of your business to understand how you can align that to impact both from like a mission standpoint, but also from like an environmental and social standpoint as well.
And so B Lab invited us to help lead what they call a community of practice for climate finance, which we kicked off in May. We're working with 50 to 60 B Corps in a pilot to really think across 401k banking and insurance, how we can drive more collaboration amongst the B Corp community, but also more programmatic efforts moving forward. And so it's really exciting about it.
is B Corp is using their influence and their own ethos on collective action to bring together this amazing group of leaders to really talk through what are the common challenges we're facing, what are the opportunities, and how can we ultimately accelerate this movement together. And so it's been an incredible example of a partner leaning in to give us a platform to help really drive change within their own community with the goal to then take that and really drive outwards and spread that knowledge within communities that are even outside of B Lab. And so...
It's been really amazing so far to work and hear those conversations, but also just incredibly grateful and humbled by B -Lab to give a smaller emerging organization that platform to work with brands that have been doing incredible work for a number of years.
Mike Smith (44:19)
Yeah, B -Lab's great people. Speaking of brands, is there a brand that you think that's kind of leading in this or that is notable in your experience?
Nick Gardner (44:27)
Yeah, I think a really good one to think about is Burton. And it's not just because it's Burton and like the super cool, you know, snowboards brand and being a snus for athlete, it's exciting for me. But the way that we approached it really ties into that story of how you drive not just the sustainable impact, but also the economic impact and internal value alignment for stakeholders. And so as you can imagine, Burton's really thought through at an incredible depth, all the different angles of
action they can take as it relates to climate over the entire arc of their company's history. And so when we brought them the insurance angle, it was a really interesting way for them to add another feather in their cap on their sustainability roadmap. But it wasn't like something where Burton had never done anything that was environmental before. And so I think for organizations that are out there, what we're offering is really a way if you're on the beginning of your journey as an easy way to step into that and progress it, or if you are the Burton's of the world.
really just add depth to a number of amazing programs that you've already kicked off. But in order for us to really solidify it with Burton, what we had to focus on was really delivering an excellent bottom insurance program. And so based on our marketplace, we were able to match them with a broker that could not only meet the size and scale of a global organization like Burton, but also deliver at a quality and service level that they've been accustomed to with a brokerage partner that they'd actually had since their inception as a company.
And in a lot of business, like relationship is obviously super important. And so we take a lot of pride in the quality of service that a lot of our partners are able to deliver. And then ultimately by going through that exercise and just taking a kind of like a business case, look back at their relationship within their own brokerage network, we're able to actually drive a lot better economics for them as part of that decision, just by having a revamped look at their existing programs. And so when we brought that full package back to Andrew McConnell, their CFO,
What really made it valuable to him was it was a really great way for him as a CFO to lean deeper into the climate conversation and actually a way to signal climate leadership as the CFO of Burton to others in the community, not just Burton's community, but broader snow sports industry. It was guaranteeing better service and also better comprehensive risk protection for him and his global organization and ultimately saved a lot of money in the process. And so.
When we think about that value prop to all of our members, we really try to hit across those where it's not going to cost them more to do better, but also as a way for the financial part of the organization to really lean in and start to drive change and then look for the next thing and the thing after that. And that's where we get excited because now we're having conversations about, you know, what can you do with banking or 401k with all these great B Corp organizations just because they've taken that first step in handling their insurance.
Mike Smith (47:17)
I love it. There's a spot for everybody. Whether you're a leader in climate, there's more you can do. Or if this is kind of your first steps, there's easy steps to take. And I love that you've kind of removed the friction out of that.
Nick Gardner (47:30)
Yeah, well, to be honest, that's what I love what y 'all are doing as well. I mean, with my work at Salesforce and Net Zero Cloud, a lot of that was focused on the enterprise companies, right? And everyone thinks about like the Coca -Cola's or Pepsi's that need to handle their supply chain and get their arms around carbon accounting and where their emissions are going. And I think what got left behind in the early days of our build out was that it was, well, what are you doing about the SMBs? And I think it's just incredibly important that you guys are giving folks the platform at
all different scales, but also like a scale where you can drive impact as a small business. And so just thank you for that same sentiment where you don't have to be this big organization to drive change. It's like you're giving folks the tools to really drive change anywhere they are in that journey. And I think that's incredibly important is making sure folks feel that they're welcome to that conversation. And just because they're not at some crazy ridiculous scale with like a massive budget and 30 person sustainability team, they can't take action today.
Mike Smith (48:30)
Yeah, there are billions of climate decisions that happen every day by people that aren't sustainability experts. And we're not going to get there unless everybody's engaged on this in some way. And so that movement building this building a bottom up solution for everybody, I think is the way to go. And that's what I love about what you're doing, what we're doing, where we're where we're both at. So I love it.
Nick Gardner (48:35)
Yeah.
Mike Smith (48:55)
All right, well, I think that's all the time that we have for today. If you're looking to save a little bit of money potentially and then join a movement on helping for climate with practically no pain at all.
I go to premiumsfortheplanet .com, surf their website. You'll find a couple of places where you can sign up really easy and I can vouch it's as easy as they say it is. So Nick, it's been great having you and thanks for your time today.
Nick Gardner (49:22)
Yeah, Mike, thank you and thank you for all the work you and your team are doing. As mentioned, just feel it's incredibly important in this moment to give folks tools that are needed. So if we can be a little bit more intelligent about those decisions, we're all better off for it. So thank you for the platform and the work you're doing and also, you know, over the arc of your own career. And I know you've worked on a lot of different things, both in the climate space, but also.
and work for our country as well. So just thank you across the board and I'm excited to be in the conversation moving forward.
Mike Smith (49:59)
Nick's a smart dude and I really enjoyed spending some time with him. I hope you did too. All right, to wrap up, I want to hear from you. Go to Aclymate .com or send an email to theclimatedad at Aclymate .com to submit a question for me or the show. Again, Aclymate as always is spelled A -C -L -Y -M -A -T -E. If your business needs help measuring, reducing, reporting or offsetting your company's climate footprint to keep those customers that you're wanting to retain, please reach out to my team at Aclymate and we'll set you up with the best, most affordable and easiest climate solution out
Thanks again to Nick Gardner for joining me and thank you all for listening. I'll be back next time with a breakdown of all things climate and with another guest. Make sure to subscribe to The Climate Dad wherever you get your podcasts and to share, like and comment on social media. I'm Mike Smith. And again, this was The Climate Dad.
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