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Developing Resilience - A Post from The Resiliency Committee
January 30, 2024
As the real estate industry grapples with increasing physical climate risk, understanding risk reduction strategies and their implications for portfolio and property management is critical to protecting occupants, assets, and balance sheets.
Our Houston conversation has expanded over the years; what once was a focus on hurricanes and floods has moved to alternate years of massive heat and drought and the occasional freeze. The heat alone last year in Texas created business losses of more than $24 billion.[1]
The ULI Developing Resilience Toolkit: Protecting Buildings and Sites, created by the ULI Urban Resilience program in partnership with Mill Creek Residential, aims to support real estate owners, developers, and investors with an initial, interactive search and reference tool for learning about risk reduction options, thereby enabling development, design, and sustainability teams or other stakeholders to quickly understand design and operational strategies that mitigate risks caused by natural hazards, their potential effects on costs and maintenance, and the co-benefits these strategies can bring.
The Toolkit includes:
Part One: Risk Assessment and Resilient Design Process – A downloadable PDF that provides guidance on understanding the exposure of a portfolio to physical climate hazards and outlines principles on incorporating resilience thinking into asset design and operations.
Part Two: Risk Reduction Matrix – A downloadable spreadsheet that provides a filterable screening tool of over 140 risk reduction strategies, including information regarding the following:
- Nine hazards and associated strategies:
- Strategy type (design or operations and maintenance);
- Applicable project types (new construction, existing buildings, and/or sites/landscapes);
- Asset type–specific considerations (e.g., considerations for multifamily vs. office buildings);
- Operations and maintenance considerations;
- Co-benefits (added amenity space, potentially reduced insurance premiums, energy/carbon emissions reductions, health and wellness, biodiversity, etc.);
- Applicable examples; and
- Further references and technical guidance.
The Developing Resilience Toolkit is one of many resources on the ULI Developing Urban Resilience website. We encourage you to explore the site and learn more about the library of tools available to members.
This is the first of a series of posts provided by the ULI Houston Urban Resilience Council in support of local education and application of content created by ULI Global for resilient and healthful places.
ULI Houston Urban Resilience Committee is comprised of the following individuals. Please reach out with any questions as we’d love to support your work!
- Rives Taylor/Gensler – co-chair
- Marina Badoian-Kriticos/HARC – co-chair
- Adele Houghton – Biositu – advisor
- Cameron Ayles/Newmark – member
- Carolyn White/Harris County Public Health – member
- Doug Coenen/Walter P Moore – member
- Elizabeth Van Horne/Harris County Public Health – member
- Elizabeth Whitton/Goodman Group – member
- Feras Al-Mukhtar/Aurp – member
- Misty Staunton/City of Houston – board liaison
- Ricardo Pittella/Arup – member
- Rucker Simon/ Walter P Moore – member
- Sherry Weesner/SMW – advisor
- Trevor Janecek/Parkway – member
Learn more: