BlueLabel
In 2019, Achmea conducted its Climate Adaptation Monitor survey to better understand the climate resilience of homes in the Netherlands. The survey revealed that most residents of the Netherlands want to adapt their homes to the impact of climate change, such as flooding. The problem was that homeowners didn’t know enough about how to do so and how much it would cost. For this reason, Achmea entered into a partnership with Royal Haskoning DHV and consultancy Nelen & Schuurmans under the name BlueLabel to give customers insights into their climate-related risks such as rain-induced flooding, flooding, heat stress and drought.
BlueLabel is a digital risk analysis tool that highlights areas vulnerable to climate-related risks with an accuracy that can pinpoint individual buildings, properties and streets. BlueLabel translates the risk into an easily understandable ranking using a context labelling system. This is depicted visually for each property, street and infrastructure object – allowing people to understand risk at a glance.
The ultimate aim of BlueLabel is to encourage a proactive approach to preventing disasters, rather than devising recovery measures in the aftermath. It provides clear insight into the areas where rainwater flooding can occur (based on an extreme rainfall event which is expected to become reality more often according to climate change scenarios) and gives detailed information down to the square metre. This translates into a risk label, or ranking, on individual buildings, streets and infrastructure. As a digital information service, Blue Label aims to empower governments, cities, industries, organisations and individuals to take targeted measures that focus on mitigating risk with insight can be used to effectively plan interventions towards greater flood resilience. The Netherland’s Delta Programme for 2018 states that every municipality must have carried out a climate stress test by 2019. BlueLabel allows cities such as Rotterdam, an early adopter of the system, to map and measure the impact of climate risks through a specially developed dashboard.
Green roofs
Under the programme brand Interpolis, Achmea is promoting the construction of ‘green roofs’ with a view to preventing damage or loss caused by severe rainfall and heat stress. Special water-absorbing plants absorb surplus water, prevent heat stress in homes or buildings and absorb carbon dioxide.
