Adumbration

The recent astronomy news included two events illustrating an amazing synchronicity - just when we were paying attention to the close pass predicted of 2012 DA14 - a large asteroid (NASA radar images, trajectory, animations), a smaller one comes out of nowhere and blasts through the Russian skies over Chelyabinsk Oblast.  Coincidence it was - the two objects were in very different orbits and had different material compositions - but it contributed to increasing attention on the non-zero probability of a seriously disruptive intersection of the orbit path we travel with that of other sub-planetary bodies - nearly the very definition of disaster.

Science Friday was among the outlets covering the story in some depth, including a segment broadcast 2/15 simultaneously with the closest approach of 2012 DA14.  I credit them for discussing the situation with knowledgable experts in the science and technology; Ira Flatow is a science booster, and I appreciate his bringing these stories to the public.

However, in their 2/22 segment on asteroid threats, Mr. Flatow is hard to shake from the idea that there might be approaches to protect us from this threat that do not involve huge government spending programs.  Even after including the B612 Foundation among guests in the prior week, as in other segments of the program (water, bridges), he asks multiple times the question of "who pays for it", clearly worried that the US government has not taken on a new highest priority.

A perspective I would like him to consider is the economic model - one that starts with the idea that the beneficiaries of a project might be the first ones we expect to foot the bill, and look at other areas of our culture as representative of how that might work in practice.    We're discussing threats of damage due to natural causes, so insurance programs offer a relevant paradigm. 

People individually and through their institutions already take tremendous steps to protect themselves from the consequences of flood, fire, hurricanes and earthquakes.  If we want economic forces freed to also begin protecting us from the hazards of collisions with asteroids, we could start be allowing such hazards to be included in insurance policies as covered events, and to particularly not preclude such coverage as an "act of god" and therefore uninsurable.  Suppose this were possible in Russia in advance of the recent window shattering fireball.  Some people would have purchased that protection, particularly those people with more material goods to lose, and their insurance companies would now be paying out for those damages.  In addition, similar insurance companies around the world would be starting to re-appraise their actuarial estimates of the risks of such events, in light of their coverage liabilities.  Backstopping those companies are the large re-insurance companies that essentially provide the service of insuring the insurance companies, for large scale events that might concentrate damages in certain regions or industries.

In spite of expectations arising from hurricane Sandy damage around NYC that the US federal government should pay for damage claims, there were already such insurance and re-insurance provisions that were triggered by that event, going to work immediately on repairing the damages.  This is an area where government insurance policies are already crowding out the commercial market for hazard insurance, as evidenced by the successful political effort to socialize those losses.  It is akin to building in flood plains, which anyone who has watched a river rise could tell has a definite risk, yet the government makes it cheap to get that flood insurance, a behavior that preferences river valley property owners against the interests of the larger community.

Continuing the analogy, in flood insurance you get cheaper rates when you take steps to avoid potential damages, such as by building on posts, or leaving the flood plain for pasture.  Another approach to insurance is illustrated by earlier days of fire insurance the insurance company provided the services of the fire department.  Self insurance is also common, if your assets are great enough to sustain the potential loss, or you take other steps to reduce the likelihood of occurrence or consequences of the risk.

That combination of likelihood and consequences is a measure that individuals make all the time, and insurance companies make as part of their business.  It applies to asteroids as well as every other potential danger.  As the risks are perceived to increase, the steps we take to avoid or mitigate them become greater.  For the threat of when worlds collide, the risk of loss is potentially very great.  As people recognize that risk and appraise it against the value of what they have to lose, relevant insurance programs would develop (provided that government policies don't precluded their being offered).  As the value of potential loss increases, people would think more about ways to mitigate the risks.  Some of those ways would include asteroid detection and deflection.

How would it work exactly?  That's impossible to say, but the effect would be that those who have the most to lose would end up paying, and the rest of us would share in the benefit.  Instead of socializing the loss, this would concentrate the costs to those that benefit most, and spread the gain across the entire population of the planet.