Preparing for the worst case - adaptation

NRU
April 20, 2016
By Leah Wong

In addition to making mitigation a priority, municipalities across the country need to develop plans for adapting to the impacts of climate change that are already being seen.

“We’re seeing the negative manifestations of climate change ... through severe weather events today, particularly flooding. But we also see hail, drought, wind and ice damage,” said University of Waterloo Intact Centre on Climate Adaptation head Blair Feltmate.

Speaking at a conference organized by McMaster University’s Centre for Climate Change Tuesday, Feltmate said that in response to these extreme weather events, municipalities need to build infrastructure so that it is not negatively affected by these events.

While new buildings and infrastructure needs to be constructed to withstand recent extreme weather events, Feltmate said it is also important to consider future weather events.

“This is effectively capital stock that has very low turnover, it’s going to be here hopefully for 100 years,’ said Feltmate. “We want to make sure we build it right today, under the umbrella of adaptation of climate change, versus building it wrong and having to build it all over again.”

City of Burlington city manager James Ridge told participants that the challenge with climate change adaptation is that it is “difficult to talk about and even harder to pay for.” He added that politically mitigation is easier to talk about than adaptation, but as the impacts of climate change are already being felt it is important to determine how to manage the risk.

“People talk enthusiastically about mitigation-it’s positive, it’s constructive, it’s hopeful, it’s sexy,” said Ridge. “Adaptation is typically pessimistic, it is worst-case scenario and invariably you’re talking about storm sewers.”

After experiencing significant flooding following heavy rainfall in August 2014, Burlington made adaptation a priority. The city has committed more than $100-million to improve the city’s stormwater management, infiltration and sanitary systems. As well, the city’s recently approved 25-year strategic plan focuses on the environment, energy and climate change.

Ridge said the city is in discussion with the Intact Centre on Climate Adaption about its home adaptation assessment program, which aids homeowners in reducing the risk of basement flooding.

The program’s trial run, which assessed 400 homes in Calgary, Kitchener and Waterloo, provided homeowners with simple solutions to prevent basement flooding, Feltmate explained. About 63 per cent of participating homeowners were able to implement 75 per cent of the recommendations within six to eight weeks.