Summary

Climate change does not just mean warming – it is causing more frequent and more severe weather disasters. Citizens pay for these disasters in property damage, taxes, insurance rates, and inflation. As warming continues there will be more wildfires, hurricanes, and heat waves and the costs will go up.

The data

This visualization shows the number of weather and climate disaster events in the US exceeding $1 billion USD. These events include droughts, wildfires, floods, severe storms, and tropical cyclones (hurricanes). The total cost of these events in 2024 was $182.7 billion USD and the total over the last ten years (2015-2024) exceeds $1.4 trillion USD. 

Citation

NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) U.S. Billion-Dollar Weather and Climate Disasters (2025). https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/billions/, DOI: 10.25921/stkw-7w73.