ClimateWire: Some of the world's leading insurance companies assembled in a room on Wall Street this fall to hear the opening pitch for a massive undertaking, constructing a chain of coastal barriers to defend the New York City region from future flooding.
The ambitious vision differs from the $14 billion system completed recently by the federal government to protect New Orleans from hurricanes that might mimic Katrina. The East Coast project, a potential network of walls, gates and dunes, would be financed...