Gro Adds Global Observed Fire Indicator to Climate Risk Assessment Suite

Gro has added a new Climate Indicator for Observed Fire (GCI - Observed Fire) to our growing Climate Risk Assessment Suite to help companies, financial institutions, and governments better identify and respond to the impacts of wildfires on populations, farmland, infrastructure, and investment portfolios.

Wildfires are a growing concern worldwide, particularly in countries and regions seeing higher temperatures and longer stretches of drought, where fire can spread more easily. 

Tools that monitor the outbreak of fires have become a key component of any comprehensive climate risk assessment. However, the need to normalize and integrate historical data from multiple platforms has made it difficult to access a consistent history of fire occurrences and severity at a global scale. While local agencies are a key resource in assessing the impact and spread of live fire emergencies, their analyses can now be paired with the historical context provided by the GCI - Observed Fire, which goes back 20 years.

The GCI - Observed Fire draws from high-resolution satellite imagery to track historical fire observations for every district worldwide. Available at the district, province, and national levels globally for the last two decades, the Indicator provides a “percent area with detected fire” across districts for each day, month, or year. 

Now, with this Indicator,

• Companies can identify the regions where fires are most likely to occur to understand the potential impacts on their supply chains. 
• Financial institutions can conduct studies on specific physical assets, commodities, or portfolio holdings in order to understand instances of damage and their impacts, as well as factors such as insurance rate changes.
• Governments can conduct detailed analyses to better understand impacts on populations and infrastructure, as well as better position assets to respond more quickly and efficiently.

The GCI - Observed Fire is accessible in Gro’s Climate Risk Navigator Application and the Gro API and can be paired with Gro’s other available Climate Indicators, such as Water Stress, Observed Flood, or Drought, to name a few examples, to get a holistic understanding of climate risk. Additionally, users can weight the Indicator by cropland or asset. For example, Observed Fire can be used to understand the recent fires in Canada (reflected in the clip below), and the potential overlap with populations, infrastructure assets, or crop growing areas - in order to better plan and prepare for damages. 

Later this year, Gro will continue to improve upon its suite of Climate Indicators by - among other improvements and additions -  making the GCI - Observed Fire predictive. This will allow companies, financial institutions, and governments to anticipate outbreaks of fire globally and plan for the event.

Contact a member of our team to see how to leverage the GCI - Observed Fire to meet your business needs.