There’s a temptation when talking about climate change to treat the numbers as abstract. Trillions of dollars. Dozens of disasters. Records broken again. The language starts to blur, and the human reality slips out of focus.
So let’s sharpen it.
According to Climate Central, 2025 ranked as the third-highest year on record for billion-dollar weather and climate disasters in the United States, trailing only 2023 and 2024. In just twelve months, the country absorbed 23 separate disasters, together costing $115 billion.
That’s not a projection. That’s not a worst-case scenario. That’s the bill we’ve already been handed.
And as always, the headline numbers only tell part of the story.
A Firestorm With a Price Tag We’ve Never Seen Before
The single costliest disaster of 2025 wasn’t a hurricane or a flood. It was fire.
The January 2025 Los Angeles wildfires shattered records, becoming the most expensive wildfire in U.S. history, with $61.2 billion in damages — roughly twice as costly as the previou…
