Primary and secondary insurance companies are increasingly refusing to insure new coal power projects outside of China, according to a new report from Insure Our Future. More than 60% of the reinsurance market is covered by companies no longer reinsuring coal projects and 39% of the primary insurance market is also covered by coal exclusions.

“Like banks, insurers can leverage access to their services as an incentive to reduce greenhouse gas emissions or exposure to the physical risks of climate change,” Jason Thistlethwaite, an expert on the economic impacts of extreme weather at the University of Waterloo, Canada, told the AP.

Munich Re, the world’s largest reinsurer, also announced earlier this month it will quit underwriting oil and gas, bringing more than one-third of the reinsurance market under oil and gas exclusions as well. Peter Bosshard, of Insure Our Future, said both public and internal pressure have driven the changes. “Insurance companies have warned about climate risks for decades and have made climate action part of their public brands. So pressure from the outside I think has also triggered pressure from within,” he told The Guardian. (AP, The Guardian, EuroNews)