Climate risk is now a core business issue. Climate change is reshaping the business landscape, through physical disruptions to assets and operations, accelerating the urgent need to transition to a low-carbon economy. For companies of all sizes, understanding and managing these risks is no longer optional.
Climate change creates severe risks on companies’ assets, sites and business activities both in direct operations and across value chains. These may originate from physical hazards such as floods or droughts, as well as transition pressures that include new regulations, carbon pricing, or shifting market conditions. These risks can significantly affect business viability, while lenders, investors, and regulators are increasingly expecting companies to identify, assess, and disclose them.
Yet for many organisations, knowing where and how to start remains the biggest challenge for many organisations.
To help address this, we publish a practical guidance on conducting climate risk assessments, which looks at the needs and critical steps for both small companies and those with more companies handling complex business models. Our aim is to make the process more accessible, proportionate and focused - whether businesses are running a first screening or refining an already established methodology.
The guidance walks through the full assessment process step by step: from defining the project objective and selecting sites and economic activities, through mapping climate hazards and transition events, to conducting qualitative and quantitative analysis and presenting results. It also addresses how to use assessment findings effectively, embedding them into risk management, resilience planning, transition strategies, and sustainability reporting.
A key principle throughout is proportionality and prioritisation: the guidance is designed to be useful for organisations with straightforward business models and limited resources, as well as for larger companies with complex operations and geographically dispersed assets. The aim is to move beyond a tick-box exercise and help organisations treat climate risk assessment as a genuine strategic tool.
Thanks to legal support from the Frank Bold expert group, the Czech Neighborhood Association Uhelná, which has been opposing the adverse effects of mining at the Polish Turów mine, has achieved a significant milestone: at their initiative, the Czech Environmental Inspectorate (CEI) launched an investigation to assess whether mining activities at Turów are causing long-term water loss on the Czech side of the border. This is one of the first cases in which the Czech office has applied the Act on the Prevention of Ecological Damage. The Inspectorate has also included the Polish mining company PGE in the proceedings.
Join us for our upcoming webinar where we present the findings from our analysis of sustainability disclosures by 100 large EU companies in high-impact sectors.
ClientEarth and Frank Bold bring you their ultimate legal CS3D analysis. It unpacks every single environmental element of the directive and can be used by national governments to unlock its potential in the next two years.
