Donald T. Hornstein *
As the outstanding contributions to this symposium demonstrate, the on-the-ground connections between water and energy are pervasive, multidimensional, and sobering. And, at the legal nexus between water and energy, the symposium’s contributors generally hint at some mix of land-use controls, common-law liability, or regulation to help mediate the challenges. Yet precisely because the challenges are so sobering, perhaps an even broader range of social institutions and solutions ought to be considered. In this essay, I offer some observations of the role that insurance may play at the energy-water nexus.
* Aubrey L. Brooks Professor of Law, University of North Carolina School of Law. Even though my experience with insurance and weather comes partly from my role as an appointed public member of the North Carolina Wind Pool, a $400 million insurance facility, the views expressed in this essay do not in any way reflect the views of the Wind Pool or even my own views when operating as a member of the Wind Pool’s Board of Directors.