Jeremy Porter, chief economist at First Street, joined the REIT Report podcast to discuss the evolving landscape of climate risk and its significant impact on corporate operations and financial performance.
First Street is a Nareit Real Estate Sustainability Partner for 2026.
Porter explained how physical climate risk now propagates through assets, suppliers, commodities, customers, and transportation networks. “Prior to this, we were thinking about all of these independently, or we were thinking about a supply chain independent of physical climate risk, and the ability to sort of pull all of those things together really helps to price in the downside and to protect facilities through adaptation and mitigation in a way that we weren't thinking about previously,” he said.
Porter shared how corporate attitudes towards climate risk have shifted from it being a peripheral concern to a core financial risk indicator. The conversation highlighted the quantifiable effects of climate risk on corporate revenues, the investment community's response, and the challenges posed by rising insurance costs.
First Street has launched a new module that allows users to assess the climate risks associated with the critical assets of all Dow Jones-listed companies, enabling them to make informed investment decisions. Porter noted that First Street intends to expand the module in future to address commodities risk, external dependencies from supply chain risk, and downstream customer risk.