Improving the Climate Resiliency of Infrastructure
Increasing trends of extreme weather patterns across the country—from sweltering heat and droughts to deep freezes to hurricanes and flooding—will continue to have a major impact on our built infrastructure unless we make fundamental changes now.
The fact is that most infrastructure, such as site developments, storm water systems, roadways, and clean water and drinking water networks, are not designed to stand up to these persistent and intense conditions. That’s why engineers and architects are rethinking what it takes to design safe infrastructure, infrastructure that can stand up to even the worst weather.
Our existing buildings are constructed to mitigate expected weather conditions based on historical data. But historical data does not paint a complete picture of what is really happening today. We can clearly see the impact of the changing climate throughout New York State. For example, Lake Ontario reached its highest recorded lake level in 2019, causing significant flooding around the lakeshore. Increased precipitation is expected with more frequent storm events and heavier downpours across the state. Sea levels along the New York coast have risen by a foot since 1900, and by 2100, sea levels are expected to be 1.5 to 4.0 feet higher than they are today.
Although we are safe from most catastrophic weather events here in the Great Lakes Region, flooding continues to be an issue for many New York communities, especially those with undersized storm water systems or located near large bodies of water. Most storm water networks are only designed to handle a 10-year rain event, even though much larger storms have been occurring annually.
“Flooding damage from naturally occurring weather events is exacerbated by the built environment,” says C2AE landscape architect Erik Cronk, RLA. “Increases in impervious surfaces—such as buildings, roads, and parking lots—generate additional storm water runoff by limiting natural infiltration of water into the ground and disrupting natural drainage patterns.” In other words, flooding is partially a development issue; it has the potential to threaten the property, livelihood, and health of anyone near densely developed areas and larger bodies of water. This is an issue for places like the Albany County Wynants Kill-Hudson River watershed, where there are 20 times more roads than streams. The national average is 4.8 times more roads than streams.
Municipal infrastructure typically relies on storm sewers to capture rainfall from impervious surfaces, like parking lots, and direct water into nearby rivers, lakes, or streams. For the towns along the shoreline of Lake Ontario, this practice has caused an increase in the speed and quantity of storm water entering the lake; in turn, flooding and erosion in the area have increased.
Fundamental changes to incorporate climate resiliency into the infrastructure design process will be key to mitigating the impacts of severe weather today and in the future. Climate-resilient design requires a slightly different approach to the project planning and design phases in order to achieve the desired resilient outcomes. Determining a given project’s overall level of climate change risk is of the utmost importance to this new approach.
Overall risk is determined by evaluating potential hazards, exploring exposure, and assessing the consequences of climate impacts over the lifetime of a project. Once the level of risk has been determined, an appropriate scope of work can be developed to lower the risk profile through innovative design solutions. These design solutions are typically multi-faceted systems, combining smart land use planning, green infrastructure, and traditional engineering practices.Another step in a climate-resilient design approach is performing a benefit-cost analysis. Resilient facilities offer both quantitative and qualitative benefits that can outweigh their upfront costs. Often times, a resilient design approach goes above and beyond traditional local zoning and building codes, which utilize historical climate data that do not accurately depict the types of severe weather events seen over the past decade.
Exceeding the requirements of local building codes is often expensive, which is why the benefit-cost analysis is critical to understanding the overall value of a climate-resilient project. The analysis will look at varying design solutions and ultimately determine which solution will provide the greatest return-on-investment in terms of climate resiliency, co-benefits, and overall project costs.
Federal and state programs for disaster mitigation have been recently funded at unprecedented levels and are further planned to skyrocket in the near future. Financial reviews from several past disaster recovery efforts revealed that every dollar invested in mitigation saves society between $4 to $6 from lost private and public assets. Here is a short-list of mitigation funding opportunities:
New York State’s Resiliency and Economic Development Initiative (REDI), a $300 million flood relief program in which 95% of available funding has gone or will go to communities in the form of grants
National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP), a $400 million program to fund pre-disaster work
Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which sets aside $40 million annually, with a minimum of $775,000 per state
With so much funding available, the topic of climate resiliency has become even more politically popular. There is a strong desire to see massive changes—quickly.
How does a community leverage this available funding to make a positive impact on their built environment and improve the rivers, lakes, and streams in the region?
The answer to this question is to require innovative solutions in the project development process.
For example, C2AE recently worked with a school district to renovate and expand an elementary school building. This addition would have increased runoff generated by the property by 200 percent. As a mitigating solution, C2AE designed an underground storage system to collect, filter, and release the runoff sustainably while maintaining open play areas and creating a safe environment for children at the school.
In addition, one of the most intuitive and effective ways an engineering firm can increase a development’s resilience to heavy rainfall is to increase the amount of greenspace a project creates or leaves. When it comes to building projects, a green roof can serve this purpose well. Green roofs act as pervious surfaces on top of buildings, reducing the volume of storm water runoff, delaying peak flows, and lowering pollution levels. C2AE has designed green roofs for multiple libraries and health care facilities, citing not only the environmental benefits but also the positive psychological impact of views to natural features.
If catastrophic weather events continue to occur in greater frequency—and the consensus among climate scientists is that they will—then communities have to invest in resilient infrastructure.
It’s fair to assume that federal, state, and local governmental agencies would prefer to plan for the incremental expense of climate-resilient infrastructure over spending hundreds of millions of dollars to repair damaged infrastructure after a severe weather event happens. We highly recommend that communities proactively explore available funding options and implement mitigation measures before severe weather hits.
