Wildfire and flood risk at any B.C. address, with the evidence to defend the number.

What is coming

On 1 May 2027 every hazard model you rely on becomes something you have to defend.

OSFI E-23 takes effect that day, and it covers third-party and vendor models. You will need an inventory, a validation, and ongoing monitoring for each one. A vendor calling its algorithm proprietary does not move that obligation off your desk. It just leaves you holding it with nothing to discharge it with.

The examiner’s question is not whether you bought a score. It is how you assessed physical risk at the property, what the number was built from, and when. Every regime below is converging on the same chain, and it runs in one direction:

address → geocode → hazard exposure → insurance status → portfolio concentration → scenarios and stress testing → capital and reinsurance → ongoing monitoring → documented underwriting decisions

OSFI is already well along it. Its Standardized Climate Scenario Exercise had participating institutions geocode roughly 12.8 million properties and run latitude and longitude against wildfire and flood hazard maps. It also found that only 12% of deposit-taking institutions collected flood-insurance coverage information on collateral, and named that a blind spot. BCFSA moved natural-catastrophe risk into credit-union commercial lending supervision in August 2026, and its quarterly Loan Data Report now collects property-level address and PID.

A province-wide average will not answer any of it. Neither will a score you cannot take apart in front of someone who asks.

What ArSite answers

Six requirements, and what meets each one.

• Physical hazard measured at the property, not the province

  OSFI B-15 expects reliable physical-risk data including the geophysical location of exposures

  EMBER and CREST assess a coordinate. Fuel is read at 30 m; flood terrain at 30 m. Nothing is inferred from a provincial average.

• A model you can inventory, validate and monitor

  OSFI E-23 Model Risk Management, in force 1 May 2027, covers third-party and vendor models

  The formula, its weights, the band edges and the artifact vintages are published and queryable. A proprietary black box would leave the obligation with you and give you nothing to discharge it with.

• Knowing whether a stored assessment is still current

  Hazard methodology, version and assessment date all appear in the data architecture regulators are converging on

  Every assessment carries two fingerprints: one over the method alone, one over the method and the measured values together. Same method, different values means the world moved. A moved method means your own model controls should fire.

• Aggregation on the unit the return actually uses

  OSFI's Climate Risk Return reports Canadian exposures by Forward Sortation Area

  Every assessment carries its FSA, so a book of properties rolls up on the regulator’s own unit without a second geocoding pass.

• Perils named the way the return names them

  The return separates wildfire from riverine, coastal, pluvial, flash and sewer-backup flood

  CREST assesses fluvial flood and names the four categories it does not assess. An unassessed peril is recorded as absence of assessment, never as a low reading.

• Concentration and change over time

  Geographic concentration monitoring, and risk change since origination

  A portfolio rolls up by FSA and by band. Re-running an address later and comparing fingerprints tells you which changed: the property or the method.

The two assessments

EMBER and CREST, delivered together and never combined.

One request returns both, each complete on its own terms. No field averages them into a single grade, because a fire index and a flood index answer different questions and a combined number would hide which one moved.

Neither returns a probability, a depth, a return period, or a loss, premium or damage figure. We never receive your sums insured and the interface has no field for them.

Who it is for

Three groups, arriving from three different obligations.

Banks and credit unions

Physical-risk data at the collateral, geographic concentration you can defend, and a model your own risk function can inventory and validate rather than take on trust.

Insurers

Accumulation and underwriting input at the address, with the peril categories separated the way the climate return separates them.

Brokers and agents

Property-specific hazard information to put in front of a client, dated and versioned, so what was disclosed and when is a matter of record.

Dates that are already set

• Aug 2026BCFSA Commercial Lending Guideline in effect for B.C. credit unions, naming natural-catastrophe risk
• NowB.C. credit-union Loan Data Reporting mandatory quarterly, with property address and PID
• Fall 2026BCFSA natural-catastrophe guidance for credit unions, and an insurer climate guideline consultation
• 1 May 2027OSFI E-23 Model Risk Management in force, covering third-party and vendor models
• Jun 2027BCFSA Loan Data Report Phase 2, all applicable fields

The Fall 2026 documents are not final requirements yet, and this page does not treat them as though they were.