Building Codes

April 20, 2016

When Legislators Forget About Building Codes, Hurricane Amnesia is Officially Here

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The Florida Building Codes enacted, enhanced, and consistently updated since the devastating building failures of Hurricane Andrew in 1992 are considered a national standard for excellence in high-wind construction.

So, when our advocacy partners sent up an “all hands alert” just two weeks before the close of the Florida Legislative session, we were shocked to learn that the Florida Building Code was under assault. Someone, apparently a Florida Home Builders Association representative, had convinced a few legislators that it would be good idea to extend the update cycle for the entire state’s code from a three-year to a six-year cycle.

They attempted this by adding an amendment added to Committee Substitute #2 on House Bill 535, stating: 

553.73 Florida Building Code.— 

 (7)(a) The commission, by rule adopted pursuant to ss.120.536 (1) and 120.54, shall update the Florida Building Code every 6 3 years.

This was done quietly as the bill headed to its last committee, and then off to the House floor. Senate Bill 704 was set to follow the same route. It’s important to note that often when legislation is made quietly and at the last minute, it’s because the action cannot hold up under public scrutiny. Or, as we like to say in Florida, it can’t survive the sunshine.

And such was the case here.

I’ve written about this growing issue before here in this blog, as well as in our paper, Disaster Resilience Rising Means the Time is Right.

The three-year cycle is used by Florida, and most states, because it follows the International Code Council development process of new model codes crafted through consensus on a three-year, recurring cycle. Even so, there is often an administrative tail on the final adoption. Regardless, when we adopt and enforce the newest building codes, our building practices stay current with new products, science innovation, and post-disaster insights.

Yet some states and jurisdictions, like Minnesota and North Carolina, have elongated code adoption from three to six, or even nine years. These extended code cycles not only leave citizens without the benefit of current model building codes, but also impede the disaster safety movement goal to rapidly incorporate beneficial, post-disaster findings into model codes.

Opponents of timely adoption have convinced some lawmakers that there is no harm in switching from a three-year to a longer, six-year update cycle. They argue that it provides a cost savings with no offsetting harm to the overall construction in those states.

But they could not be more wrong. Here is how we made our case to the Florida press:

Stalling the timely adoption of the newest building code represents a backward step for construction, design, innovation, and disaster resilience overall with negative impacts across many fronts.

1. Families will be denied the latest insights and advances in construction technology and the benefits of innovation and advances that deliver savings across energy, fire and other cost drivers (ordinary water losses and/or catastrophic losses). For example, this will put essential code enhancements for flood resistance on hold.

2. The excellent building code policy record in Florida is one of the most important supports for the often-stressed property insurance system. This type of policy setback could have devastating effects on the delicate balance that has been so hard won post-Andrew.

3. The El Niño year has already delivered the projected tornadic and high wind events. The expected La Niña could bring similarly heightened activity. Further, many credible meteorology professionals suggest strong potential for a hurricane season reminiscent of the 2004-2005 activity level.

Shortly after the news spread of these amendments altering the Florida building code cycle from three to six years, the effort was abandoned. And, we are very relieved that it failed. But we should all be wary. If any Florida Legislator can be convinced that we don’t need to maintain current building codes in the most high-risk hurricane state, then we are not only forgetting history, but we are dooming ourselves to repeat it.

With this in mind, we’ve launched a new initiative, #HurricaneStrong, to help remind the public, leaders, and families alike, that we must remain vigilant to remain disaster resilient. I hope you’ll join us.

January 20, 2016

How Big Data Means “Bigger is Better” for Weather Safety & Resilience

9-3-15 Figure 4 Data Comparison Final

As conversations about the application of Big Data come out of the 2016 World Economic Forum in Davos this week, I recall how the headline, Is IBM Building the Most Powerful Weather Service the World Has Ever Seen?, made perfect sense to me. The article described how IBM purchased The Weather Company’s digital and data assets in a deal inspired by opportunities in Big Data. The Wall Street Journal valued the transaction at more than $2 billion, and IBM described their rationale:

With this acquisition, IBM is going to harness one of the largest big data               opportunities in the world — weather. Weather is probably the single largest swing factor in business performance — it impacts 1/3 of the world’s GDP and in the U.S. alone, weather is responsible for about half a trillion dollars in impact. Weather affects every aspect of the economy – energy usage, travel and transportation, new construction, agricultural yields, mall and restaurant traffic, etc.

This move is a profound illustration of the opportunity that Big Data presents in the realm of disaster resilience, a topic we addressed in our paper, Understanding the Intersection of Resilience, Big Data, and the Internet of Things in a Changing Insurance Marketplace.

Truly, with $500 Billion (yes they say billion) in opportunity costs on the line, Big (weather) Data can not only inform to, but can revolutionize industries and movements across the world.

In my last blog, I discussed the movement behind resilience metrics—an issue that can be categorized as a “Big Data” problem. Like all sectors, we’re experiencing the advent of exploding amounts of data, and one growing source of this data is from the Internet of Things (IoT).

One IoT example in homes is the Nest Thermostat. The device not only indicates the temperature in your house, but it issues alerts if it detects significant temperature swings. The obvious advantage is that you learn of potential system problems right away. Consider the power of learning that your home temperature is dropping during winter weather conditions. This could provide invaluable lead time to prevent costly damage like frozen pipes, especially if you’re away from home when the alert arrives. The device can help you keep up with routine maintenance as well by tracking air filter usage, and reminding you when filters are ready to be changed.

Smart home technology like Nest’s helps us understand IoT and information (data) creation, but the questions of how to harness and leverage all the new information once we have it takes us back to the Big Data side of the equation…

Big Data issues are taking center stage in our movement as social science efforts explore the interrelation of Big Data and resilience at the United Nations’ Global Pulse, the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Center, the U.S. National Science Foundation and the Japan Science and Technology Agency, and the World Bank. These initiatives raise common issues around resilience and Big Data, including:

  • How can we protect privacy while still benefitting from the data?
  • How (can) the different, emerging resiliency efforts integrate into an understandable system?
  • Who are the decision-makers, data owners, and what are their rights?
  • Should insurers/reinsurers heighten engagement or simply design their own system?

It’s clear that tremendous value lies in the use of Big Data, like the IBM weather data deal described above. What we envision is applying Big Data on building features managed through a philosophy of transparency to benefit residents and communities alike. We want to capture and share the relevant building data that drives ultimate home performance during a disaster or over time, and I will cover this in a future blog.

IBM’s vision for Big (weather) Data is just the start. We all must get and stay involved to ensure we leverage Big Data, one of most promising and powerful tools for creating a reliably strong, safe and durable built environment. As we know, that is the most essential element of resilience.

December 10, 2015

If What Gets Measured Gets Done, How Can We Measure Resilience?

Many of us in the disaster-resilience movement have witnessed and participated in the creation of resilience measurement systems. Along the way, we’ve observed that one of the strongest aspects of our movement is also what makes measurement so difficult: diversity. There are so many puzzle pieces that must be considered—economic, physical, political, and social—just to name a few.

In October of this year, we released a paper entitled Understanding the Intersection of Resilience, Big Data, and the Internet of Things in the Changing Insurance Marketplace, in which we explored resilience measurement as well as issues of Big Data and the Internet of Things (IoT). The good news is that the landscape is rich with efforts to apply a measuring stick to resilience from micro- up to macro-levels. The other news is that this issue is mindboggling in its enormity.

So over the next couple of posts, I plan to return to an examination of these issues because Big Data and the IoT can transform the disaster-resilience movement, and the implications are almost unfathomable. These concepts and their intersection present opportunities that we must understand and plan for before we can harvest any benefits, or at least prevent unintended consequences.

The first step is to develop uniform, consistent metrics to gauge progress toward resilient communities. We need verifiable, practical, and replicable tools. And we need to apply these tools to quality data.

At FLASH, we are concerned with community-wide resilience, but our work focuses more particularly on strengthening homes and safeguarding families from the ground up with strong building codes, beyond-code mitigation, and personal preparedness as part of a culture of resilience. These are foundational aspects of community resilience of course.

But here’s the challenge. Data on building characteristics and performance is not historically granular enough to derive ongoing insights except in certain post-disaster situations. Even then, we must obtain onsite analysis. That is why we need forensic engineering efforts like FEMA’s Mitigation Assessment Team post-disaster to assess structural performance, and evaluate failure patterns to inform to better building codes and standards in the future.

But this is where Big Data and the need for quality data (IoT) can make a difference. When IoT generated-data from new or emerging technologies like sensors can give us precise information on how a building performs, how will we leverage the information for better building practices to avoid future losses? Can we use the Big Data generated by the IoT to get ahead of the next disaster instead of learning after the fact? And what are the accepted metrics (if any) to build a credible database for our insights?

One way to understand the potential of Big Data and IoT is to apply the question to modern water detection systems. The marketplace is exploding with products like Fibaro Flood Sensor, Quirky Overflow, Utilitech Leak Detector, Wally, WaterCop, and more. These systems use sensors to detect moisture, temperature, and humidity and can identify water leakage from all kinds of sources like dishwashers, frozen pipes, washing machine hoses, and water heaters. This triggers an alert to the resident who can stop the leak, clean up the water, and prevent or mitigate costly damage and repairs.

This is a very meaningful breakthrough in loss prevention given the billions paid annually in water-involved insurance losses.

But in our vision of Big Data and IoT, we’d take it several steps further. Leak occurrences would be analyzed in the context of type of appliance, type of pipes, weather conditions, age of home, installation methods, etc. And any relevant specifics would be captured to develop insights on better (or worse) performing construction methods, products, and technologies. This data would inform to future products and practices.

From there, a database of homes with certain characteristics would be built. And this same approach using sensors and tech could be applied to many other failure modes from wind to seismic. All of these databases then would become elements of resilience measurement. Indeed, some already are.

The water detection example shows how resilience metrics are a Big Data problem. The myriad water detection devices cited above create data, but how to sort, harvest, and use the data effectively has a long way to go if it will be valuable beyond the individual loss. This type of micro-measurement is just one of the many ways we grapple with resilience measurement.

In our paper, we also examine various macro-resilience metrics/frameworks/indices including the U.S. Resiliency Council’s effort to rank buildings for seismic performance.

The key is working out how the micro-metrics and data can be developed and reliably applied in the macro-context of community resilience. There are existing options. For residential structures, MLS could include scores on the structural integrity, and attendant durability and life expectancy of a home and/or its location relative to natural hazards. Trulia and Zillow can make this information transparent to homeowners, and it would finally be a factor in driving the market value. Think about it. How is it that the most important aspect of a home—its structural integrity—is still not transparent to homeowners?

Cisco projects that by the year 2020 there will be 37 billion smart products on the market. Juniper Research predicts that there will be 10 million smart connected devices by 2017. It’s time for us to figure out a formula to harness the explosion of data that is headed our way.

This is an important conversation that is only beginning. Our next blog will look at the larger issue of Big Data and disaster resilience and how these movements are converging. And, you may want to join us as we spotlight this issue during our 2016 Annual Conference Meeting with a panel entitled The Next Generation of Resilient Communities. We are bringing together leading voices from government, private, and association to share their perspectives on current initiatives, opportunities, and challenges of fostering resilient communities.

Either way, we look forward to the ongoing conversation.

 

 

August 27, 2015

Even As the Ground Shakes Near Memphis, Leaders Chose Denial Over Disaster Safety

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Photo Credit: WBIR

Last week, I used this forum to discuss the first of our six recommendations to innovate the U.S. building code system published in our new commentary, Disaster Resilience Rising Means the Time is Right. This week, I am scheduled to discuss our second recommendation:

2. Optimize property protection opportunities in model   code and standard development by balancing all of the existing values, including public health, safety, and welfare.

This is a timely discussion in light of action underway at the Memphis City Council and Shelby County Commission where it is clear that some Tennessee officials are missing the critical linkage between public policy and disaster safety.

The purpose of the International Residential Code is “to establish minimum requirements to safeguard the public safety, health and general welfare….” Unfortunately, the issue of cost is often the loudest argument against the adoption of modern building codes. But the welfare of the family, or families, during the expected lifespan of a home should be given equal weight in building code considerations.

Today, however, the upfront cost to the builder or first buyer has eclipsed the critical, long-term value of welfare.

And this is exactly the problem in Memphis and Shelby County, where city council members and county commissioners are poised to complete passage of amendments that will further weaken home bracing requirements by as much as 50 percent.

Some background: In 2014, after decades of delay, these same leaders implemented a compromise that required modern earthquake bracing for the first time. However, that compromise fell short of the model code by about 30 percent, allowing homebuilders to construct homes below the suggested levels of minimum, national life-safety codes.

Now they are moving to further reduce requirements essential for safety in not just earthquakes, but floods, and high winds. They are suggesting short-term cost savings as a justification for this eye-popping action, ignoring long-term home quality.

They are also placing unknowing families in potentially deadly jeopardy.

According to news reports, Councilman Reid Hedgepeth constructed a $750,000 home last summer, and identified the cost for seismic requirements at about $10,000, or 1.33% of the total construction cost. By his support of the new amendments, are he and his peers (including Councilman Jim Strickland) saying that a one percent savings is worth the risk that a home will collapse in an earthquake, float away in a flood, or tear apart in a windstorm?

This latest Memphis situation is another incident in a long-running back and forth between local homebuilder interests and a coalition of academics, architects, emergency managers, engineers, risk communicators, safety advocates, and scientific researchers. The coalition has gone to extraordinary lengths to work with local builders and elected officials by providing extensive, third-party studies to overcome the fears of undue cost; by bringing forth national experts with unassailable building science performance data to explain the value of the new building practices; and much more.

Even after all this sincere effort, and a 3.5 magnitude earthquake next door in Tipton County this week, local leaders are still willing to abandon the needed upgrades.

Last August, the South Napa Valley earthquake provided proof positive of phenomenal building performance driven by use of the new model codes. Sadly, Memphis and Shelby County have gone barely a year with their improved code, and soon they will again build in a way that is certain to fall short when the worst happens there.

According to the Oxford dictionary, welfare is defined as, “the health, happiness, and fortunes of a person or a group.”

With the amendments close to passage, all we are left to do is etch the names of the officials involved into the public record. That way, when the worst happens, we can recognize the path to diminished “health, happiness, and fortunes” for residents of Western Tennessee. 

August 17, 2015

Exploring Innovative Intersections of Building Codes and Resilience

Last week, we released our latest building code commentary, Disaster Resilience Rising Means the Time is Right with six recommendations for how to innovate the current U.S. building code system.

So in our next six blog posts, we are going to examine each of our recommendations, one by one, with an eye on how to take each of these ideas forward. Our first recommendation is to:

  1. “Establish a standing code and standard development process to accelerate post-catastrophe, forensic engineering insights into model codes and standards.”

In the Commentary, we highlighted different organizations that investigate post-disaster building performance. We discussed the myriad scientific and technical stakeholders in the building realm, with a focus on FEMA’s Mitigation Assessment Team (MAT)—the signature body that diagnoses building performance and failure causes after major U.S. disasters. Once we understand the MAT and similar systems, along with historic building failure findings, it becomes clear that these investigations are essential to future building performance in deadly, costly catastrophes.

Our recommendation is simple. It proposes an enhancement of the current post-disaster building “crash investigation” system by establishing a standing mechanism to accelerate incorporation of building performance findings into model building codes. The current International Code Council development process creates model building codes on three year cycles. We would like to see disaster insights incorporated into the building codes more rapidly than three years, so that minimum construction standards reflect the costly lessons learned from disaster without delay.

It is important to note that not all post-disaster insights are fashioned into codes from the top down. Often, as in Florida post-Andrew and New York post-Sandy, local and state officials update codes with ground-up disaster insights. But this means that only those affected areas benefit from those costly lessons. Why not use model codes to ensure the lessons benefit a larger population? Either way, whether through national model code development or from local amendments, prompt integration of improved building practices into building codes is an essential way to ensure such failures only happen once.

Thanks to dedicated engineers and scientists, we already do an excellent job of analyzing the successes and failures of building performance after earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, and even wildfires. And the faster we integrate these costly insights into the way we build, the better off we will all be because deadly lessons learned once shouldn’t be learned twice.

We look forward to working with our partners at the International Code Council to fast track these lessons to benefit all in harm’s way.

May 18, 2015

A Multi-hazard World Means Buildings Must Multitask

5-18-15 Matthew Wall for LCH Blog

When we think of traditional Texas perils, high wind, hail, hurricanes and wildfires are top of mind. But, as Texas has gone from one earthquake “felt” in 100 years to more than 70 in the last ten, awareness is shifting to include seismic events too.

In fact, a recent USGS report identifies 17 areas within eight states with increased rates of induced seismicity.

That’s why we asked Dr. Michael Blanpied of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) to join us for our March 31 Texas State Collaborative (TSC) meeting in Austin where he very capably addressed the issue of “potentially induced seismicity”, and seismic activity in general.

Dr. Blanpied explained how USGS creates and updates seismic hazard maps every six years. This is essential information as seismic design ratings used for building codes are based on these maps. Through the 2008 hazard map update, earthquakes caused by industrial practices were removed from the analysis if certain conditions were met. This eliminated most earthquakes associated with mining, oil and gas production, and fluid injection. This was deemed to be the appropriate approach for designing long-term building codes, so now USGS is developing models to forecast the extent of hazardous ground shaking in the areas of recorded, significant, increased seismic activity.

A final hazard model is scheduled for release at the end of 2015.

We had a vivid reminder of the relevance of Dr. Blanpied’s presentation on May 7 when a 4.0 magnitude earthquake occurred 30 miles southwest of Dallas in Johnson County. In the aftermath of this earthquake, the Texas Railroad Commission required the operators of nearby disposal wells to perform testing regarding the effect of wastewater injection into subsurface rock formations. Thankfully, the earthquake caused no injuries, but it did cause minor damage to the foundation of two mobile homes.

And Texas isn’t the only state to experience increased seismicity. The Oklahoma Geologic Survey identified 5,415 earthquakes in 2014, and this tally omits many smaller earthquakes. The Central U.S. has seen a hundred-fold increase in earthquakes to the extent that Oklahoma now exceeds California in earthquake activity. Yes, you read that right.

This issue is driving complex scientific and social questions, especially as credible studies have now linked seismic activity to wastewater injection. However, our focus is not on causation, but whether or not the built environment is prepared regardless of causation.

Our TSC initiative is dedicated to helping Texas address shortcomings in the existing building code system, so do we now add earthquake to the mix? If so, where do we begin?

We are confronting a compounding natural hazard problem, but we cannot take our focus off the traditional perils either. The same evening of the 4.0 magnitude earthquake on May 7 in North Texas, at least two confirmed tornadoes touched down with severe weather continuing into the weekend.

This example represents a growing challenge facing disaster resilience advocates across the globe: what is the ideal mix of building science to address earthquake, high wind, and hail too?

The issue came up last year during our public awareness work with the Virginia Department of Emergency Management. Like Texas, Virginia has a coastline vulnerable to hurricanes, and residents have experienced deadly high-wind events, including tornadoes and the 2012 Derecho. In 2011, they experienced a 5.8 magnitude earthquake in Mineral that is considered the “most widely felt earthquake in U.S. history”. Even so, high wind is still the most common concern. That’s why we worked to identify a “two-for-one” building science solution to drive our messaging.

This video is the result of our effort and highlights what families can do to mitigate against both high wind and earthquakes. It is focused on one concept—a continuous load path, or a well-connected home where the roof ties to walls and walls tie to the foundation. The building principle is not new, but talking about it for high wind and seismic safety in the same conversation is atypical.

Texas and Virginia share a similar challenges regarding the need for integrated hazard mitigation solutions, and they are not alone. With or without induced seismicity, earthquakes can occur nearly anywhere. The same goes for high wind.

This uncertainty increases our resolve to find solutions that work for every location. We must build in a way that adequately addresses risks, even when they overlap. Delivering on multi-hazard mitigation solutions will challenge the disaster-resilience community, but we have the right team in place.

Let’s give families options that fit their reality even if it’s complicated.

May 6, 2015

The Only Thing Worse Than No Mitigation is the Wrong Mitigation

LCH Blog Photo

After decades of effort, the marketplace for tornado safe rooms and shelters is finally rising. Consider that more than 3,000 tornado shelter permits have been issued in the City of Moore, Oklahoma since the March 25 tornado outbreak, and officials project that 7,800 Moore homes (40%) now have the essential safety feature.

Success here can be traced to relentless commitment to perfecting the building science by visionaries like FLASH Leadership Partner Dr. Ernst Kiesling and the FEMA Building Science team; strategic messaging by our many partners including the NSSA; and cost/benefit studies by noted economists like Dr. Kevin Simmons of Austin College.

The progress is significant, but enter the next challenge. Safe rooms aren’t as prevalent as they should be throughout all vulnerable areas yet, and not all tornado safe rooms are created equal.

So now that the market is responding, we must reemphasize the message that safe rooms and shelters should be constructed or fabricated to the most modern, stringent guidance or standards of either FEMA P-320, P-361 or ICC/NSSA 500. A nonconforming, poorly constructed safe room can do more harm than good by creating a false sense of security and putting families at risk.

For this reason, we took the opportunity at the 2015 NAHB International Builders Show “Home Safe Home Showcase” with our Legacy Partners FEMA and Portland Cement Association (PCA) to ask the questions that families want answered. The video series provides an overview of five types of safe rooms that can be built during new construction or added to an existing structure above-ground, below-ground, inside the home, outside in the garage, or in the yard.

Builders at the show were pleasantly surprised to learn that most types of safe rooms can be installed and completed in a day with the average cost for an 8-by-8-foot room from $8,000 to $9,500. Each offers different advantages, but all—when built right—provide the best available life safety protection against tornadoes. And it is essential that we point out the need to use a tested door.

One family knows firsthand the value of a safe room. Kevin and Sarabeth Harrison survived the deadly April 27, 2011 tornado that descended upon Athens, Alabama, by taking refuge in their concrete-block safe room with their two young children. The Harrisons have since moved to another home, installed another type of safe room, and have had to take shelter in that safe room during a tornado warning. We captured their inspirational story in our A Tale of Two Homes – Tornado, and it went viral, all the way to the National Building Museum “Designing for Disaster” exhibit.

Since then, the myth that there is nothing you can do to protect against a tornado has been under siege by accurate, life-saving information that a safe room is the right place to weather a tornado.

As stories of disaster survival often do, the Harrison video helps people understand that they can survive. Our new video series will help families understand exactly how to do it.

April 10, 2015

We Can Build Better in Advance of Tornadoes

In light of last night’s deadly tornadoes in Illinois, I am raising (again) the issue of building in tornado zones using the new, groundbreaking construction philosophy that emerged after the catastrophic Tuscaloosa, Joplin and Moore outbreaks from recent years. The engineering case is strong, and last week Dr. Kevin Simmons, an Austin College economist, added to the economic case as well – http://bit.ly/1auWHdu.

Clearly, it is time to spread the word to leaders that by adding $1 per square foot to the cost of construction and incorporating tornado safe rooms to homes in high-wind zones, we can forever alter the deadly pattern of death and destruction that follow the annual, typical tornado outbreaks that will continue.

Below are excerpts from our May 2013 paper, “Building Codes: The Foundation for Resilience” that describe the engineering breakthrough.

For more than three years, the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) building science engineers, and leading academic researchers have called for a new way of building to meet the challenge of saving lives while also preserving property in the face of tornado outbreaks. Their work, published as the Dual-Objective-Based Tornado Design Philosophy, is landmark in that it defies traditional assertions that “there is nothing you can affordably build to withstand tornadoes.”[1]

The research-informed effort comes in response to field investigations that documented a pattern of disproportionate structure collapse in tornado outbreaks. They point out how even small design changes can make a difference, and they have developed guidelines to estimate the tornado-induced loads. This will provide reasonable targets for designers to use in their future work. Homes built to these newer, research-informed guidelines will have the advantage of better wall bracing, improved roof tie-downs and overall stronger connections.

According to Dr. David O. Prevatt, Associate Professor of the University of Florida, Department of Civil and Coastal Engineering, “If we can put a man on the moon, we can keep a roof on a house, and our research demonstrates it is possible to design and build houses that protect people and structures from deadly winds. Techniques developed and implemented in Florida that have reduced hurricane losses can be applied and used in houses to also reduce tornado losses.”

This novel new approach is buoyed by the finding by the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) that even if a tornado is EF-4 or EF-5, 95 percent of the damage generated occurs at EF-3 and below. What this means is that the enhanced practices can bring material increases in home strength. Moreover, since 90 percent of all tornadoes never exceed EF-2 with winds of up to 135 mph, wind-resistant building practices like those included in the code can save lives and dramatically improve building performance in nearly every tornado event.

We believe that this is possibly one of the most important breakthroughs in high wind design during the past two decades as it offers an affordable innovation that can potentially improve life safety and economic well-being for millions of residents throughout the U.S.

Homes are a long-term investment. Eighty percent of our homes are more than 20 years old, and most of them will be around for at least another 30 years. Thus, it’s important not only for individual families to make careful choices now as they rebuild, but each community must acknowledge its responsibility to rebuild in a resilient way.

In January of 2015, during the International Builders Show, we analyzed and released updated NOAA Storm Prediction Center data showing that nearly 90% of U.S. counties experience tornado watches. This information underscores the point that the impact of building differently is not just beneficial to those who are directly hit by tornadoes. Having a stronger home and a safe room will bring beneficial peace of mind to all in harm’s way as they hunker down, worry, and wonder if their town will be next.

 [1] Van de Lindt, John W., et al. 2013. “Dual-Objective-Based Tornado Design Philosophy.” Available: http://ascelibrary.org/doi/abs/10.1061/%28ASCE%29ST.1943-541X.0000622

February 6, 2015

Making the Link: Stronger Flood Building Standards Required for Federal Funds

On January 30, 2015, the President took a major step to increasing the flood resilience in this country by establishing a Federal Flood Risk Management Standard, which ties federal dollars to stronger flood construction standards. The concept is simple: if federal funds are spent, they should be invested in structures built to last and withstand flooding.

FEMA reports that approximately 85% of disaster declarations are due to flooding, and according to the White House, between 1980 and 2013, the U.S. incurred in excess of $260 billion in flood-related damages.

And the costs are increasing. Congressional hearing testimony by Chad Berginnis, Executive Director of the Association of State Floodplain Managers, cited that flood losses have increased to average $10 billion per year.

But what parts of the country are at risk? Coastal areas seem to be the obvious answer. And more than 50 percent of Americans live or work in coastal counties.

But it’s not just coastal areas that should be flood ready and flood smart. Flooding affects the entire country.

While the Federal government insures structures for flood risk, some portion of damage incurred during flood events is not covered by insurance, and is then passed onto taxpayers. According to Congressional hearing testimony, insurance coverage from natural disaster losses is typically less than 20 percent of the total loss, and since 1983, the U.S. has spent nearly $1 trillion dollars on disaster recovery and rebuilding.

So what does this new flood standard require?

The standard requires the elevation of new buildings, roads, and other infrastructure, in and around floodplains, that are built or substantially repaired with Federal funding.

There are several ways to determine the required elevation: (1) build using “a climate-informed science approach that uses the best-available, actionable hydrologic and hydraulic data and methods that integrate current and future changes in flooding based on climate science”; (2) elevate by adding 2 feet to the base flood elevation for non-critical structures or 3 feet for critical structures; or (3) construct to the 500-year flood elevation.

Increasing freeboard, or the elevation of a structure above the base flood elevation, can result in drastic savings in the form of lessening property damage, as well as insurance discounts. The 2008 Supplement to the 2006 Evaluation of the National Flood Insurance Program’s Building Standards validated the 2006 publication’s general hypothesis of freeboard’s benefits to homeowners and communities. This report provides information regarding NFIP premiums and construction costs as they correlate to different amounts of freeboard.

Dedicated professionals in Federal agencies have been working together over the past year to develop these standards to increase our country’s resilience to flood-related disaster.

Leadership in mitigation is when people champion the cause of stopping the devastation and destruction that so many have experienced from countless disasters. Powerful voices and action are vital, because despite the many scientific advances in meteorological prediction and building science that have taught us repeatedly that we can reduce property damage by how we build, there is a phenomena of cognitive dissonance (as explained well by our friend Margaret Davidson) in which many homeowners still say, “it won’t happen to me, so I don’t need to take action”.

This specific act of leadership will make the link between money to recover, to more resilient construction that may in turn not need future recovery funds. This is a big step on the path to resilience.

We applaud the President for his leadership on this critical issue.

To learn more about the new federal flood standard and implementation guidelines (currently available for public comment), visit: whitehouse.gov.

December 23, 2014

Living Through Disaster and Rising Up Resilient

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I have no doubt that our 2014 FLASH Annual Conference was one of the best and most memorable of our sixteen years. And it’s not hyperbole to say this, even though; there have been excellent gatherings in the past.

But this year was different.  Across the breadth, talent, and authenticity of the conference contributors, something clicked. And one of the moments it clicked the loudest was when the two leaders from Moore, Oklahoma took the stage for an interview with Jim Cantore of The Weather Channel.

We invited Oklahoma State Rep. Mark McBride and Moore City Councilman Terry Cavnar to share the story of the enactment of the first 135 mph high wind building code in the United States. We looked forward to the firsthand account of how they worked with engineers and pioneered adoption of this new approach derived from the innovative Dual-Objective-Based Tornado Design Philosophy . In the preceding year, we had written more than one piece about their story and celebrated their willingness to debunk old thinking that, “there’s nothing you can affordably build to withstand a tornado.”

So we thought we knew what to expect. But their moving story—so resonant and memorable—didn’t orbit around engineering stronger roof-to-wall connections.

It was a story of humanity.

Councilman Cavnar began by relating his love of Moore as a lifelong resident, a family man, business leader, officer in his church, and member of the City Council. He described the damage that he, his family, friends, customers, and associates suffered on May 20, 2013. Remember, the $2 billion in losses from the EF5 Moore tornado make it the costliest to ever strike Oklahoma. But the human toll was even worse—24 deaths and 230 injuries included 10 children because the tornado struck just as school was letting out.

According to Councilman Cavnar, “There just wasn’t much in my life that wasn’t touched.” As he spoke, we were all transfixed with not a dry eye in the room.

Jim Cantore’s reporting has taken him to ground zero after many devastating storms, and he leveraged his extraordinary experience and sensitivity while sharing details of what he witnessed in Moore, “The difference is that I get to come home. These gentlemen do not.”

Cantore complimented the panelists for their efforts in supporting stronger building codes so that the next storm could turn out differently.

Councilman Cavnar said his town had to learn a hard lesson after suffering through several damaging tornadoes during the past 15 years, including the 200 mph monster that struck last year. “My house had $30,000 of damage, but I had people come in [after the tornado] the next morning with no house, no car, no shoes, no wallet.”

Representative McBride is a homebuilder who has come to understand the benefits of constructing stronger homes. He knows firsthand that better building is more important than granite countertops. “We spend so much time selling granite, selling tile showers, selling this, selling that. But we don’t sell an impact-resistant roof; we don’t sell the hurricane clips; we don’t sell the extra nail patterns you got in the walls,” said McBride. He discussed how homeowners need to ask the right questions to be informed about how their home will perform in a disaster.

Under the landmark code in Moore, for an extra $2 per square foot, new homes should withstand 135 mph winds.

Councilman Cavnar said the repeated pounding by powerful tornadoes during the past 15 years forced residents to band together and demand better building codes, “We were at the point where to do nothing was unacceptable.”

McBride brought reality and levity into the discussion when he recalled how price sensitive the construction industry is, and how builders like his own father resist any extra charges for items such as stronger garage doors, even if they keep out the wind that might otherwise destroy a home. He drove home the point by referring to a garage door company that Councilman Cavnar bought several years ago.

“My dad being a builder, he fired Terry [Cavnar] one time for a $15 increase.”

Councilman Cavnar and Representative McBride’s insights provided a needed reminder that resilience isn’t a lofty idea—resilience is about basic survival and how well you and your neighbors can get back on your feet after the unthinkable happens.

My belief is that when (not if) we permanently, successfully interrupt the cycle of “build-destroy-rebuild” it will be because local leaders like these two stepped up and put a stake in the ground against building practices that lead to death, injury, and community failure.

But to break this cycle, we’ll need to continue to bring together a truly kinetic mix of people, just like them, who leave us inspired and renewed to continue our pursuit of better building with disaster safety and resilience in mind.