UK insurers paid out a record £585 million in weather-related home damage claims in 2024, 28% higher than the previous year, according to data from the Association of British Insurers (ABI).
The figure is the highest since the ABI began tracking the data in 2017 and was driven by 12 named storms across the 2023/2024 season, the most since 2015/2016.
Against that backdrop, QBE and seven firms from its claims supply chain have formed a consortium to co-invest in nature restoration and carbon credit generation at Boothby Wildland in Lincolnshire. Named the QBE Buyers Club, the group includes law firms Clyde & Co, DWF and Keoghs, risk and claims administration partner Sedgwick, claims company Prism Claims Group, accident repair group FMG and a national salvage dealer.
It is believed to be the UK insurance sector's first formal supply-chain-led nature restoration consortium, the company said.
The consortium has committed to funding rewilding and carbon credit generation at Boothby Wildland over 50 years. The site, a former intensive arable farm bought by rewilding company Nattergal in December 2021, spans more than 600 hectares and was the first project to reach the implementation phase of the government's Landscape Recovery scheme, run by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra).
Developed with Nattergal and brokered by carbon credit specialist Nature Broking, the consortium will fund carbon removal across 18 dedicated acres. Across the wider 500-plus acre site, the project is expected to generate an estimated 25,000 verified credits over 100 years under the UK Woodland Carbon Code. Beavers have already been reintroduced to the site's West Glen river as part of efforts to restore the waterway and surrounding wetland habitat.
Joanna Lloyd-Davies, head of sustainability, international, at QBE, said the initiative "supports all three of our sustainability focus areas: supporting climate resilience and the transition, enabling a resilient workforce and partnering for impact in this case, through our value chain," adding that it "gives every partner a direct stake in a piece of land they can visit, watch recover, and be proud of."
The launch comes as insurers face closer scrutiny of their climate risk management practices.
The Prudential Regulation Authority's updated supervisory statement SS5/25, which took effect in December 2025 and replaced SS3/19, requires insurers to integrate climate risk across asset and liability management, underwriting, reserving and the Own Risk and Solvency Assessment process, with firms expected to complete internal gap assessments by June 2026.
That sits alongside emerging ISSB-aligned disclosure standards and Science Based Targets initiative guidance, both of which push firms to show credible climate action across their value chains rather than in isolation.
Luke Baldwin, chief executive of Nature Broking, said the model works because buyers are directly connected to the land they fund: "They can visit it, see it change, and show their stakeholders something real."
The project draws on research from the Knepp Estate in Sussex, the UK's longest-running rewilding project. Work led by soil sampling firm Agricarbon found that rewilded soil there is storing carbon at least as fast as models predict for 25-year-old broadleaf woodland, absorbing up to 4.8 tonnes more carbon dioxide per hectare a year than a nearby conventional farm.
A separate 2024 study backed by Defra, Queen Mary University of London and Nattergal found that rewilding scrub and grassland sequesters carbon at rates comparable to newly planted native woodland over at least the first 20 years, with most sequestration happening below ground.
Claire Traynor, chief commercial officer at Nattergal, said the consortium "is meaningfully contributing to scaled and measurable environmental outcomes, while demonstrating a credible model for private investment in nature," adding: "We hope it inspires others to take a similarly ambitious approach."
