Site-walked flood and heat checks on warehouses before investors buy or lease
TL;DR Plinthwise writes flood and heat due diligence reports on warehouses and industrial parks. It pairs hazard maps with a site survey of plinth heights, drains and roof heat, then turns the result into likely downtime and fix costs. Funds, REITs and large tenants pay per asset before a deal.
Indian warehouse clusters often sit on cheap, low-lying land at city edges. When Chennai flooded in 2015, a revenue official put losses above ₹50,000 crore, and industrial units and factories were badly waterlogged with their losses not even counted[1].
The World Bank estimates that adaptation could avoid pluvial flood losses of US$5 billion a year by 2030 in Indian cities, about ₹48,000 crore, rising to US$30 billion by 2070[2].
So how do buyers check flood risk today? A typical warehouse purchase checks title, structure and lease, and flood risk gets judged by asking the broker whether the site floods.
The seed pitched AI analytics of hyperlocal climate risk for all real estate. The directory already covers lender loan books, plot flood histories and city works, and global models cover the rest from a distance. So this version narrows it to one asset type where the money per decision is big - warehouses and industrial parks.
Each report starts with flood, rainfall and heat layers for the site and its catchment. An engineer then walks the site, measuring plinth and dock heights against past water marks, mapping drains and culverts, and logging roof heat in summer. A model combines both into a plain answer. How many days of downtime might the site lose in a bad year, and what would raised docks, pumps or cool roofs cost to fix that? Reports carry their uncertainty openly and name every data source.
Plinthwise sells risk reports only. It is not an insurance surveyor and does not settle claims.
Buyers are real-estate funds and REITs adding logistics assets, large tenants such as 3PLs and e-commerce firms choosing sites, and lenders funding warehouse projects. They pay technical due diligence firms today. There's no public price for a climate add-on in India, so I'd test a fixed fee per asset with a portfolio rate.
The RBI's draft climate disclosure framework, issued in February 2024, would require large banks and NBFCs to report on climate risk from FY2025-26, with metrics to follow from FY2027-28[3]. SEBI's BRSR Core pushes top listed companies to report across their value chain[4]. And IGBC now rates green logistics parks and warehouses[5], so owners already pay for site-level sustainability checks.
There's no public figure for climate due-diligence spend on Indian warehouses. The narrowest firm signal is regulatory - banks and large NBFCs facing the RBI framework[3] will ask borrowers for site-level evidence. Treat the World Bank flood-loss estimate[2] as adjacent context, not a market size.
One US climate-analytics firm sells asset-level multi-peril analytics to banks, asset managers and REITs[6]. Another offers screening and asset deep dives for disclosure frameworks[7]. Both are model-led and global. Indian technical due diligence firms check structure and title but rarely model downtime.
The gap in India is ground truth - drain blockages, plinth heights and dock levels that no satellite layer shows.
| Difficulty | Moderate (43/100) |
| Starting capital | ₹0.7–1.4 Cr |
| Time to launch | 6–9 months |
The hardest part is credibility. Funds will compare your downtime estimates with what actually happens, so early reports have to be careful and honest about error. The other bottleneck is hiring site engineers who can survey a large shed and then write about it clearly, which is rarer than you'd think.
No licence is needed for risk reports, but stay clear of insurance work.
Building this outside India? The categories above usually have a local equivalent, so check with your own regulator.
Don't trust AI to give a firm flood answer without the site walk. Models miss local drains and plinth levels, which is exactly why the engineer visits.
Want to work out the AI layer for Plinthwise? Talk to Yash →
I like this for a founder with a hydrology or civil engineering background and links to logistics funds. If you only want to build maps then skip it. First prove that three funds or tenants will pay for a report on a live deal, and that one report changed the price or the fix-up plan.
Plan for roughly ₹0.7–1.4 Cr, mostly for hazard data, engineers who walk sites and building the model.
Not for risk reports. Assessing insurance losses would need an IRDAI surveyor licence, and drone surveys must follow DGCA rules.
Yes. Hazard data exists in most markets, and the site walk is what sets you apart. Check local drone and survey rules first.
The free Plinthwise validation kit has the line-by-line capital breakdown, the effort scoring, a rules checklist, a 14-day validation sprint with pass/fail targets, a 90-day launch plan, 10 interview questions for funds and tenants, and 5 assumptions to test. Download the kit →
Thinking about building Plinthwise or something close to it? The make-or-break work is earning trust with downtime estimates that funds will check against real floods, and that's exactly the kind of thing I help founders plan for. If you need a hand, you know where to find me. Talk to Yash →
For illustration only. Names are fictional and ideas hypothetical; sourced facts are real but may be out of date. Nothing here is legal, financial or professional advice, and Yash Khatri is not personally liable for any use of it. Read the full disclaimer.