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    Climate Physical Risk: Data Sources, Calibration and Validation by Hazard

    A pragmatic walk-through of hazard-specific data pipelines for flood, wind and heat, including calibration choices and validation metrics.

    By Jonas Osman Abdelghafour · · 11 min read
    Climate Physical Risk: Data Sources, Calibration and Validation by Hazard — technical illustration by Jonas Osman Abdelghafour, climate and modelling risk modelling
    Climate Physical Risk: Data Sources, Calibration and Validation by Hazard — Climate · Modelling

    Hazard-by-hazard is the only honest approach

    A single "climate score" hides more than it reveals. Flood, wind and heat each demand distinct data, functional forms and validation.

    Flood

    Combine hydrological hazard layers with exposure-level elevation. Calibrate depth-damage curves against published loss studies.

    Wind

    Use tropical and extratropical catalogues separately. Validate against event footprints and industry loss estimates.

    Heat

    Model productivity and asset degradation channels. Cross-check with sector case studies.

    Overlaid physical hazard intensity layers for flood, wind and heat exposure, illustrating "Hazard-by-hazard is the only honest approach" in Climate Physical Risk: Data Sources, Calibration and Validation by Hazard
    Figure 1. Overlaid physical hazard intensity layers for flood, wind and heat exposure, in the context of hazard-by-hazard is the only honest approach.
    Prior and posterior densities illustrating Bayesian parameter updating, illustrating "Hazard-by-hazard is the only honest approach" in Climate Physical Risk: Data Sources, Calibration and Validation by Hazard
    Figure 2. Prior and posterior densities illustrating Bayesian parameter updating, in the context of hazard-by-hazard is the only honest approach.

    Validation that regulators trust

    Every hazard model should ship with backtests, sensitivity tables, and a documented uncertainty envelope.

    End-to-end data and calibration pipeline from source data to reported risk measures, illustrating "Validation that regulators trust" in Climate Physical Risk: Data Sources, Calibration and Validation by Hazard
    Figure 3. End-to-end data and calibration pipeline from source data to reported risk measures, in the context of validation that regulators trust.

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