WOODBRIDGE, NJ and SAN JOSE, CA – June 24, 2025– Global Risk Consultants Corp. (GRC), the world’s leading provider of unbundled property risk engineering services, and VDE Americas, a recognized authority in solar hail risk analytics, today announced a strategic partnership to integrate VDE’s hail probable maximum loss (PML) analytics into GRC’s comprehensive Natural Hazards risk assessment reports for the solar power industry.
“This strategic partnership delivers a powerful solution and a broader service outreach to our clients having solar power among their assets, to help navigate increasingly severe convective storm weather events,” said Greg Bates, President and CEO of GRC. “By incorporating VDE Americas’ specialized hail risk assessment capabilities into our Natural Hazards risk engineering services, we’re providing our solar power clients with even more complete and actionable risk mitigation insights in hail-prone regions.”
The enhanced Natural Hazards risk assessment reports will combine GRC’s 67 years of global, independent property risk consulting experience with VDE’s proprietary hail risk modeling expertise. VDE’s methodology integrates radar and ground-based meteorological data with the hail resilience characteristics of specific project equipment to deliver highly detailed, site-specific financial loss estimates.
“Our hail risk technology was purpose-built to address the catastrophic losses we’ve witnessed in the solar industry,” said Brian Grenko, President and CEO of VDE Americas. “Partnering with GRC allows us to expand our impact and help more organizations quantify and mitigate hail risk—which now represents over 50% of total insured losses in the solar sector, despite accounting for less than 2% of claims by volume.”
This partnership strengthens a shared commitment to data-driven risk management and risk transfer best practices. The integrated Natural Hazards PML risk reports support better-informed design, procurement, and operational decisions—helping project stakeholders improve resiliency through equipment selection and best practices like “hail stow” tracker positioning. These risk reduction strategies may also lead to more favorable insurance terms, including potentially greater capacity being offered, and premium reductions.
The announcement comes amid an active 2025 hail season, with elevated risk predictions expected through September.
