Actuaries are experienced in the assessment and management of the financial consequences of risks and in the summarisation and presentation of complex data. Many of the organisations that actuaries support are concerned with climate risk and with how it will affect their business – for example general insurers, banks and investment managers. The index is intended to provide a useful measure of how the extremes of weather are changing in order to support assessment of the change in risk.
The Australian Actuaries Climate Index (AACI) refers to a number of indices that provide objective measures of historical extreme weather and sea levels. It is intended to provide a useful monitoring tool of climate trends.
The index values observed to date indicate increases relative to the reference period in the extremes of both temperature and sea level. As such we expect that risks that are linked to higher temperatures and higher sea levels have increased. The wind level extremes appear broadly unchanged overall, however results vary by region and season. Over the last 20 years Australia has experienced two phases of drought and this is evident in the consecutive dry days and rainfall metrics which show corresponding periods of high and low index results.
To explore the index select Component Graphs or Regions under the Explore menu. The default display will show you seasonal observations represented by the blue/red bars, and a black line which denotes the five-year moving average. You can also filter by season, for example, you can filter the chart to give the index values and moving average for summer only.
For an optimal browsing experience, view the component graphs and regions via Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge. Delays in loading the page(s) can occur when using Internet Explorer.