OCARA Methodological Guide

The OCARA methodological guide was originally published in September 2021. It was last updated in May 2023.

Foreword

On OCARA

OCARA’s goal is to help economic actors build resilience against current and future climate impacts.

This method has been named OCARA, which stands for "Operational Climate Adaptation and Resilience Assessment."

This process consists of three steps: (1) analyzing current resilience, (2) analyzing future trends in impact scenarios, and (3) developing adaptation and resilience plans.

This guide focuses primarily on Step 1, as it applies to all companies wishing to embark on this process. Steps 2 and 3, on the other hand, depend on the results of Step 1 and must be adapted to the specific context of each economic actor. That is why only the general principles are described for Steps 2 and 3.

This methodological guide presents a framework for analyzing a company’s level of resilience to the impacts of climate change. It is intended for an informed audience—that is, individuals with knowledge of climate change and the basic principles of risk analysis.

Finally, this method is the first of its kind and is therefore bound to be refined as we gather feedback. The method is updated regularly to reflect these advancements. The last update was in May 2023.

In particular, it has recently been adapted to provide the best possible support to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and mid-sized companies, as part of a partnership with Bpifrance and ADEME, through the Diag Adaptation program.

More information is available at https://www.carbone4.com/projet-ocara

Abstract

The climates we know are changing : Floods are becoming more severe, and the frequency of wildfires and heat waves is increasing; rainfall and drought patterns are becoming more erratic. Our companies must therefore anticipate these changes and ensure they are prepared to weather these new climate shocks.

In response to the lack of standards for analyzing these physical risks, Carbone 4 launched the OCARA project. Developed in partnership with Ademe, HDI Global France, Bureau Veritas, and the Grand Est Chamber of Commerce and Industry, OCARA is the leading analytics platform on business resilience to climate change.

OCARA provides a method and a tool for conducting a climate resilience assessment and launching an adaptation process. OCARA is structured around three key steps. The climate resilience analysis (Step 1) assesses the the company's level of resilience in the current climate. Combined with Step 2 (climate impact projections and scenarios), this approach makes it possible to conduct a a physical risk assessment that is both holistic and systemic. Step 3 (resilience plan) enables the identification and planning of adaptation pathways.

OCARA allows you to understand, identify, and prioritize weak and strong signals of climate change based on a holistic view of climate impacts across the company’s entire value chain. It also helps identify potential courses of action to develop an adaptation plan in order to strengthen the resilience of the company as a whole. It provides operating results on the specific risks of climate change for the company: the processes most at risk, the most significant impacts, the most resilient elements, the most critical risks, as well as potential courses of action.

OCARA introduces several major methodological advances: an operational approach with a three-step process-based methodology, a list of processes to be evaluated (120 processes divided into three dependency scopes), a list of climate hazards that could cause potential impacts, and standardized assessment metrics that allow for aggregating information and comparing results. OCARA provides a practical interpretation of concepts related to adaptation and offers solutions tailored to businesses.

Like the Bilan Carbone method, the The OCARA method is designed to be used directly by companies and refined based on practical experience and to deepen understanding. To help promote its use, the method and tool are available for free download, and further developments are already planned.

We recently removed the OCARA Excel file from the download page because it was no longer being updated.
You'll find a fairly similar and more intuitive version in our publication OCARA for Small and Medium-Sized Businesses.

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Authors

Carbone 4 Project Team: Violaine Lepousez, Clément Mallet, Maxime Aboukrat, Théo Girard, Justine Mossé, Jean-Marc Jancovici

Contact

Violaine Lepousez, Head of the Physical Risks and Adaptation Division at Carbone 4

violaine.lepousez@carbone4.com

Project team: ocara@carbone4.com

Financial Partners

ADEME, HDI Global France, Bureau Veritas, Grand-Est Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

Committee of Experts

Céline Philips and Christophe Barel (ADEME), Marina Pitrel and Clémence Ricochon (Rhine-Meuse Water Agency), Christophe Besnier (Bureau Veritas), Amandine Amat and Frédéric Papelard (Grand Est Chamber of Commerce and Industry), Marie Colin and Fabien Palhol (CEREMA), Jean-Paul Etaix and Raphaël Papin (HDI Global France), Vivian Depoues (I4CE), Hervé le Treut (Pierre-Simon-Laplace Institute), Félix Lallemand (Ph.D. in Ecology, National Museum of Natural History).

Companies beta-testing the method

Atalu, Arthur Metz, Jus de Fruits d’Alsace, Lacoste, Lucart, Poeppelmann, Saint-Gobain, Séché, and Siemens.

Acknowledgments

Carbone 4 would like to thank the project’s financial partners, the members of the expert committee, the beta-testing companies, and the proofreaders of this guide.