Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and the Knowledge Transfer Networks for Industrial Mathematics and for Financial Services held a workshop as part of the activities of the Environmental Risk Management Special Interest Group (ERM-SIG). The workshop was held at Lloyd's of London on 24 February 2010, and comprised of two separate sessions with details as below.

During the last year the ERM-SIG carried out a range of activities in the insurance sector and this event offers industry and academia an opportunity to see practical examples of industry-academic collaborations in the area of environmental risk management and their relevance to the insurance industry's priorities. It also aims to introduce new academics to the insurance industry in order to inspire and encourage companies to form new collaborations that develop and exploit innovations in environmental risk management for the benefit of the insurance sector.

Morning Session: Current projects (10:00 to 12:30pm)

• Update on the roadmap for Environmental Risk Management and REM-SIG activities - Vera Hazelwood, Industrial Mathematics KTN
• Performance improvements in reinsurance optimisation calculations through parallel programming techniques. Collaboration between Willis and Oxford University - Jurgen Gaiser-Porter, Willis
• Uncertainty and flood mapping. Catchment Change Network - Keith Beven, University of Lancaster
• Translating seasonal forecasts into year ahead hurricane numbers: The outlook and some recent advances in ENSEMBLES, Collaboration between Lloyd’s of London and London School of Economics - Leonard Smith, London School of Economics
• Update on NERC CASE awards
• NERC funding options to enable collaborations between the insurance sector and academia for the benefit of business.

Lunch and networking (12:30 to 14:00)

Afternoon Session: Dependency modelling (14:00 to 16:00)

• The Unholy Trinity: Fat Tails, Tail Dependence and Micro-correlations - Roger Cooke, Resources for the Future and TU Delft.

• Risk diversification: Dependency modelling using copulas - an alternative approach - Martyn Dorey, Camradata.

• What industry needs from dependency modelling - Cathryn Dunlop, Catlin

Based on a series of consultations to determine insurance industry priorities, this programme was designed to encourage Insurance and Reinsurance companies to work more closely with the UK's academic and research asset base, supported by investments from NERC.

More details on speakers for the afternoon session are available by sending an email to Vera Hazelwood.