Thousands of residents across California who have been ordered to evacuate due to wildfires may be eligible for cost reimbursement from their insurance company, Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara says.

Mr Lara says homeowners’ or renters’ insurance coverage may help with evacuation and relocation costs, even if their homes are not damaged or destroyed.

Wildfires are ravaging California, many caused by lightning during a rare thunderstorm passage on Monday last week and exacerbated by gusty winds and extreme heat. The most active fires are burning in San Francisco’s Bay Area, prompting evacuations and forcing a state of emergency in California.

Tens of thousands of Californians have been ordered to evacuate, and hundreds of structures across the state are currently at risk, the New York-based Insurance Information Institute (III) says.

Guy Carpenter says there are currently 68 large fire incidents that are being actively managed across the US, up from just 12 a week earlier. More than 200,000 hectares have burned, and 15,000 wildland firefighters and support personnel are battling fires across the country.

“With more than 367 wildfires sweeping the state, I want evacuees to know additional living expense coverage can be available to help ease the financial burden of mandatory evacuations,” Mr Lara said on Thursday.

Additional living expense coverage, known as ALE, typically includes food and housing costs, furniture rental, relocation, storage and extra transport expenses. Mr Lara urged evacuees to contact their insurance company to verify their ALE coverage.

Mr Lara is backing Senate Bill 872, authored by Senator Bill Dodd, which expands the scope of ALE coverage in homeowners’ insurance policies after a declared wildfire emergency, clarifies policyholder rights if the policyholder decides to relocate rather than rebuild the destroyed home, and adopts other consumer protections after a major catastrophic event.

Large and damaging wildfires are also burning in Colorado amid intensifying drought conditions and above average summer temperatures. There are air quality alerts in areas where smoke from fires in the mountains is causing health risks for many large communities.

“As we progress through wildfire and hurricane season, it is more important than ever that the financial stability of the industry is kept intact,” III says.

“That means respecting the integrity of insurance contracts and the risk-assessment process, and closing the door to misguided attempts to raid insurer coffers in order to cover pandemic risks that insurance was never designed to address.”

The III says reinterpreting insurance contracts would deplete the capital stored to cover major risks, potentially harming consumers when they need insurance the most, it says.

Insurers collect $US310 billion ($432.8 billion) in premium annually in California.