Pearl Ayem
Climate & Nature Risk Leader | Quantitative Risk Modelling | Data Engineering at Scale
I lead climate and nature risk modelling, turning physical science into the financial terms that boards, investors and governments act on. I am also a hands-on engineer: I build the models and the data pipelines behind them, then take the results to the board.
I'm Canadian, and my career began in the field in British Columbia, flying LiDAR drones and installing weather stations. A full scholarship brought me to the University of Cambridge, and Bloomberg kept me in London. On secondment to GFANZ, I designed the data model behind a global climate data platform launched at COP28, and wrote speech content and figures delivered by Mark Carney, now Prime Minister of Canada, and Michael Bloomberg. Since then I have advised FTSE 100 boards on climate risk and now lead risk modelling at Risilience.
What I do
Science, engineering and the boardroom
Climate and nature risk leadership
I lead a team of modellers, economists, data scientists and engineers quantifying physical, transition and supply-chain risk in financial terms for FTSE 100 companies, asset managers, insurers and global consumer brands. I also lead my firm's applied AI programme, which halved model release cycles.
Data engineering at planetary scale
Hundreds of terabytes of climate, soil and crop data on BigQuery. I designed a pipeline that processes 570 billion rows of climate data, then cut its storage costs by 94% and its full run time from days to about 14 hours.
Climate policy and finance
From GFANZ and the UN to client disclosures: ISSB, TCFD, CSRD, TPT and TNFD, and Canada's OSFI Guideline B-15, CSSB standards (CSDS 1 and 2) and CSA climate disclosure rules.
Selected work
Things I have built
Planetary-scale crop water balance engine
A daily soil water balance model for 920,000 farmland locations under seven climate models and four emissions pathways to 2070. I built it solo over four months, from the science to production, and cut its cloud costs by 94%. Includes an interactive version you can run yourself.
Read the case study →Net-Zero Data Public Utility
At Bloomberg, on secondment to GFANZ, I designed the complete data model for this free global climate-transition data platform, ran vendor selection, oversaw Google's engineers and built the COP28 launch demos. It is now the UNFCCC's Climate Data Utility.
Visit the platform →Antarctic surface melt
My Cambridge MPhil with the British Antarctic Survey: machine learning on 1.7 billion geospatial data points to find the atmospheric drivers of ice shelf melt. Now used as MPhil teaching material.
Read the thesis →Press and features
Profiles by the British Science Association and the University of Cambridge, and invited writing on climate careers.
See the coverage →My path
From fieldwork to the boardroom
Fieldwork and first engineering
Graduated top of my class in Atmospheric Science at UBC. Led LiDAR drone mapping across British Columbia, Alberta and Yukon, delivering 18 projects in a year for government, BC Wildfire Service, search-and-rescue teams and the natural resource sector. Installed and calibrated weather stations to WMO standards, measured the atmosphere during the Buckley Bay wildfires, led 18 computer science teaching assistants, and ran sustainable business development for a Vancouver hospitality group, raising CAD 1.5M in investment.
A full scholarship to Cambridge
Awarded the Scott Polar Scholarship, given to the top applicant, for an MPhil in Polar Studies (Atmospheric Physics) with the British Antarctic Survey.
Climate data for global finance
Net-Zero Data Lead on secondment to GFANZ. Designed the Net-Zero Data Public Utility's data model, managed 40 analysts for GFANZ's COP27 data launch, wrote speech content for Mark Carney and Michael Bloomberg, worked with President Macron's office, the governments of Switzerland and Singapore, CDP and the UNFCCC, and co-authored reports with the ISSB and IEA.
Advising the boardroom
Led climate risk engagements for FTSE 100 and FTSE 250 clients: earnings-at-risk, scenario analysis, double materiality and transition planning. Presented to C-suites, boards and press, and personally closed contracts worth up to £820,000.
Leading risk modelling
Lead Environmental Risk Modeller: I lead a cross-functional team, built a planetary-scale crop water balance engine, and lead the firm's applied AI work.
Speaking and advisory
Invite me to speak
I speak to boards, investors, technical teams and students on:
Climate risk in financial terms
Translating climate and nature risk into numbers, and the questions boards should be asking.
Climate data for finance
Building climate data infrastructure: lessons from GFANZ, the UN and COP.
Planetary-scale engineering
Running climate models at planetary scale without a planetary cloud bill.
Applied AI in risk modelling
Where AI genuinely speeds up scientific modelling, and where it does not.
Water, nature and supply chains
How water stress will reshape where the world's crops can grow.
Careers across STEM, finance and policy
Featured in the British Science Association's Smashing Stereotypes 2025.
Beyond work, I served on the board of the Compassionate Eye Foundation, which funds grassroots projects aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals, and co-led Polar Impact, which won £50,000 in grants and organised climate justice panels at COP26.
