Dealing with Uncertainty in Scenario Analysis: Stochastic vs. Deterministic Approaches
Release Date: 09/28/2023
Modelling Economic Complexity: Insights for Risk Professionals
Climate Risk Podcast
Hear from Prof. J. Doyne Farmer, Professor of Complex Systems Science at the University of Oxford, as we explore new modelling approaches designed to better capture the complex and chaotic nature of our climate and economy. We spend a lot of time on this podcast covering the transition to a low carbon economy, which will be driven largely by policies and technological innovation. These policies tend to be based on insights from economics. And our view on the pace of innovation is often informed by expert judgement. But traditional economic models often oversimplify the world, leading to poor...
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Predicting Our Climate Future: What We Do, Don’t and Can’t Know
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Hear from Prof. David Stainforth of LSE’s Grantham Research Institute, as we explore the limitations of climate modelling and the implications for risk management. There are some things in life that we can be virtually certain about: if one throws a ball into the air, it will fall back down. Similarly, scientists have evidence beyond reasonable doubt that atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide have increased a lot in the recent past. But there are quite a lot of things that we don’t know with any confidence, giving rise to significant uncertainty when we try to forecast those...
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Hear from Prof. Pete Smith of the University of Aberdeen, as we explore the overlap in the challenges from, and solutions to, climate change and biodiversity loss. Climate change and biodiversity loss are often treated separately – in science, policy, and even risk management. But as the connections between these global crises come into sharper focus, it’s clear that understanding them together is essential for real progress. In this episode, we break down those silos of climate and nature, exploring an integrated approach and how it might help us address these challenges...
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Carbon Pricing: Harnessing the Power of Markets to Drive Climate Action
Climate Risk Podcast
Hear from Gordon Bennett, Managing Director at ICE, as we dive into theory and practice of carbon pricing and its important role in driving the transition to net zero. Carbon pricing is the poster child of market-based solutions to climate change. The principle is simple: by assigning a cost to greenhouse gas emissions, we incentivize polluters to emit less, and to do so in the most cost-effective way. But there’s a significant gap between the theory and practice. Currently, only 24% of global emissions – about 12.8 gigatonnes – are covered by pricing mechanisms such as carbon taxes...
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Rethinking Natural Catastrophe Modeling: New Approaches for a Changing Climate
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Hear from three leading experts in natural catastrophe modeling, as we explore how climate change is causing the insurance industry to rethink their approach to modeling extreme weather. In the previous episode, we discussed the challenges facing the insurance industry from climate change – so in this episode, we’re going to dive into some of the solutions. Since natural catastrophe (Nat Cat) modeling was established in the late 1980s, the predictive power of their models has come from the statistical analysis of historical data. But as climate change continues to push the frequency and...
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Uninsurable: The Future of Insurance in a Changing Climate
Climate Risk Podcast
Hear from two leading experts, as we explore how insurance is adapting to climate change and the role of the industry beyond underwriting. Insurance plays a critical role in protecting households and businesses from the impacts of climate change, and with physical risks on the rise, it will become ever more important. However, insurers have also been significantly impacted by these risks, with annual losses from natural catastrophes exceeding 100 billion dollars for four consecutive years. The primary concern is that these physical risks eventually become uninsurable, as we are already...
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Urban Resilience: How Our Cities Must Adapt to Climate Change
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Hear from Emma Howard Boyd CBE, Chair of the London Climate Resilience Review, as we dive into the challenges of climate adaptation and what it means for our cities. 2023 was not only the warmest year on record, it also marked the warmest 10-year period on record. As we witness first-hand the impacts of a warming climate, including heatwaves, more intense precipitation and increased flooding, the case for building resilience against these risks becomes ever more important. This is particularly so in our cities, where the concentration of populations and economic activity make adaptation...
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GARP’s Sustainability & Climate Risk Certificate: Register Now
Climate Risk Podcast
In this special episode, hear from Tony Rooke, Executive Director at Howden Group Holdings and Beth Gould Creller, GARP’s Sustainability & Climate Risk Program Lead, as they discuss the recent improvements to the SCR’s syllabus and learning experience. Long-time listeners of the podcast will have noticed that we often mention GARP’s Sustainability & Climate Risk (SCR) Certificate. It’s a program that GARP launched in 2020, providing all the foundational knowledge you need to become a climate risk leader within your own firm. This episode is a special one, as we bring...
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Why NDCs Aren’t Working and How to Fix Them
Climate Risk Podcast
Hear from Lord Adair Turner, Chair of the Energy Transitions Commission, as we explore the shortcomings of nationally determined contributions and how they might be improved. Nationally determined contributions, or NDCs, are a bit like transition plans for countries, in that they set out what a country plans to do in order to meet the ambitions of the Paris Agreement. However, NDCs are voluntary, and collectively they don’t currently have us on track to limit global warming to less than 2 degrees, let alone the more ambitious target of 1.5 degrees. Today’s guest believes that this is a...
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Why Nature Belongs in Corporate Thinking
Climate Risk Podcast
Hear from Robin Millington, CEO of Planet Tracker, as we discuss how and why businesses should be thinking about their dependencies and impacts on nature. Sustainability is a complex topic, and for a long time, climate has been at the heart of discussion. Other challenges like pollution and biodiversity loss have often been sidelined. Recently however, following the work of the TNFD and others, these issues have risen up the corporate agenda, within the wider context of our impact and dependency on nature. Throughout her career, this guest has highlighted the importance of integrating...
info_outlineHear from Ron Dembo, Founder and CEO of riskthinking.ai, as we apply stochastic thinking to the challenge of climate scenario analysis.
One of the most difficult aspects of managing climate risk is its inherent uncertainty. Because we can’t know with absolute confidence what our future climate, economy or society will look like, we therefore can’t know exactly when, where, or how intensely climate risks will manifest.
A technique commonly applied to this problem is scenario analysis. By building a picture of what the future might look like, firms can formulate risk management strategies appropriate for that scenario.
However, today’s guest believes we’re only scratching the surface of what scenario analysis can do for our financial institutions. In today’s episode, we’ll home in on the idea of stochastic scenario analysis; what it is, how it works, and what makes it different to the traditional approach to scenario analysis. We’ll explore:
· The difference between deterministic and stochastic scenario analysis;
· The advantages of using large sets of scenarios generated by expert judgment; and
· What stochastic scenario analysis means for risk professionals.
To find out more about the Sustainability and Climate Risk (SCR®) Certificate, follow this link: https://www.garp.org/scr
For more information on climate risk, visit GARP’s Global Sustainability and Climate Risk Resource Center: https://www.garp.org/sustainability-climate
If you have any questions, thoughts, or feedback regarding this podcast series, we would love to hear from you at: [email protected]
Links from today’s discussion:
Speaker’s Bio
Ron Dembo, Founder and CEO, riskthinking.ai
Ron is an academic, author, entrepreneur, and consultant to the some of the world’s largest corporations and banks. He has had a distinguished academic career as a professor at Yale University and as visiting professor at MIT. He is a Lifetime Fellow of The Fields Institute for Research in Mathematical Sciences, and has received numerous awards for his work in mathematical optimization, finance, and climate change.
Ron was previously the Founder and CEO of Algorithmics, an enterprise risk management software provider with over 70% of the world’s top 100 banks as clients. After Algorithmics was acquired by Fitch Group, Ron later founded riskthinking.ai, a company pioneering the use of stochastic analysis to accurately price climate risk into the financial markets.