Climate Risk, Adaptation, and Resilience

The ability of societies and corporates to thrive in the future hinges upon today’s actions. BCG works with governments and international organizations to mitigate the harshest impacts of climate change—and with private sector leaders to build climate resilience while remaining competitive in a low-carbon economy.

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In 2024, global temperatures surpassed 1.5°C above preindustrial levels for the first time—offering a stark preview of intensifying threats such as hurricanes, flooding, and extreme heat. Since 2000, climate-related disasters have caused over $3.6 trillion in damages globally. Without climate adaptation, physical risk could reduce company EBITDA by 5% to 25% by 2050, depending on geography and sector, while vulnerable communities face rising displacement and disruption.

Our Approach to Climate Risk, Adaptation, and Resilience

Our work with the public and private sectors includes assessing exposure to climate risks, supporting the development of climate adaptation and resilience strategies, embedding climate risk mitigation into planning, designing effective solution responses, and mobilizing funding to ensure maximum protection for people, the economy, and natural ecosystems.

For the Public Sector

  • Assessing existing local and national adaptation plans based on our proprietary framework and benchmarking those plans against best practices  
  • Supporting decision-makers with advanced analytics to assess climate risks and climate impact on social, economic, and natural factors  
  • Mobilizing action and funding by estimating the cost of inaction, defining the landscape for bankable projects, and calculating the return on investment 
  • Partnering with relevant private sector actors to deliver on the plans and advance broader climate adaptation and resilience efforts

For the Private Sector

  • Mapping climate risks and hazards (such as flooding and extreme heat) to company assets  
  • Prioritizing assets for deep-dive risk assessment and then identifying climate vulnerabilities for those assets  
  • Quantifying the operational and financial impact of the risks to those assets  
  • Defining the most effective climate adaptation and resilience measures to address risks to priority assets  
  • Partnering with relevant public sector actors to deliver on the adaptation plans and advance broader climate adaptation and resilience efforts
The ability of societies and corporates to thrive in the future hinges upon today’s actions. BCG works with governments and international organizations to mitigate the harshest impacts of climate change—and with private sector leaders to build climate resilience while remaining competitive in a low-carbon economy.

Our Client Work in Climate Risk, Adaptation, and Resilience

Our climate risk consulting experts developed an analytical approach to assess impact across the broad span of climate risks to the assets of a main roads' infrastructure operator, informing strategic considerations on the most-relevant areas for resiliency intervention.
Our climate adaptation consulting experts supported a Southeast Asian city to identify priority actions to deliver resilience against a range of anticipated sea-level rise scenarios. Different solutions were assessed from a social, economic and natural asset perspective to provide a rigorous analytical fact base for both the development of project solutions as well as the design of an effective national adaptation plan.
Our climate resilience consulting experts supported a megacity government in West Africa to enable data-driven decision-making regarding building their climate-resilience by determining the cost of climate inaction in terms of population affected, damage to infrastructure, and impact on the city's GDP. Based on this, an A&R project pipeline was developed with financing from both the public and private sectors.
Our climate risk assessment experts reviewed a major developed country’s official A&R strategies to both determine the best starting point and assess gaps against best practices and then designed an approach and timeline of action required to develop a national adaptation plan within a short timeframe.

Our Partnerships in Climate Risk, Adaptation, and Resilience

UN High-Level Climate Change Champions



As part of our ongoing collaboration with the UN Climate Change High-Level Champions, BCG has conducted research and analysis to outline the context, challenges, and requirements to achieve the Sharm el-Sheikh Adaptation Outcomes by 2030. This work has been captured in a series of deep-dive reports.

In these reports, we explore the adaptation outcomes in four key areas, highlighting what is needed to meet these bold yet actionable targets. Our reports build on our global experience of supporting leaders across the public and private sector in defining their pathways to climate adaptation and resilience.

Our Insights on Climate Risk, Adaptation, and Resilience

Our Climate Risk, Adaptation, and Resilience Consulting Experts

Our experts in climate resilience consulting and climate adaptation consulting help both private and public sector clients identify and address their most pressing vulnerabilities surrounding climate impact. Here are some of our experts on the topic.

Managing Director & Senior Partner

Charmian Caines

Managing Director & Senior Partner
London

Managing Director &amp; Partner;<br/>Southeast Asia Lead, Climate and Sustainability

Dave Sivaprasad

Managing Director & Partner;
Southeast Asia Lead, Climate and Sustainability
Singapore

Managing Director & Partner

Tina Zuzek-Arden

Managing Director & Partner
Washington, DC

Managing Director & Partner

Annika Zawadzki

Managing Director & Partner
Cologne

Managing Director & Partner

Lorenzo Fantini

Managing Director & Partner
Milan

Managing Director &amp; Senior Partner; Head of BCG Casablanca office; Head of BCG Tech Hub in Africa

Hamid Maher

Managing Director & Senior Partner; Head of BCG Casablanca office; Head of BCG Tech Hub in Africa
Casablanca

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