Climate change realities hit home design in 2011.
Is climate change real, or are the storms and fires we experienced in 2011 just a bad coincidence, as Tony Abbott believes?
Ten years ago I was working with a fellow house design consultant who had the foresight to design and patent a new, stronger Shearwall system for use in new home construction in high wind category areas. He had been working on the idea for over ten years before that, and it had nearly sent him broke.
He could not get traction for the development of his invention in Australia, but found big corporations in the US who would exploit his invention through licensing.
I hate to think how rich Paul must be right now. Talk about reading the future of home design and climate change. But he had already told me then that his shearwall helped homes to stand, where others next door were blown away in Tornadoes in the US.
Are Climate Change Skeptics a dying breed?
I suspect that that the fringe of climate change skeptics are switching in their positions right now, and may soon be ghosts who fold their tents and steal away and disappear in the cover of darkness. I have noticed Tony Abbott is no longer the cocksure climate skeptic he once was, and is timid about revealing his current position on this, as it might be seen as “the biggest surrender since Singapore”!
Are there one in one hundred scientists left who can legitimately call themselves climate scientists and climate skeptics at the same time? Are even climate skeptics real? I have only ever seen one on the TV, and he did not look like a scientist to me. Just an old armchair contrarian to me. One cranky old man does make a debate. So lets flush out all you climate scientists who know something that other scientists have missed.
A brief look at Weather events in 2011
The World. Equal Highest ever land and sea temperatures ever recorded [2010]
Australia. In january and February 2011.
- 75% of Queensland, Australia was declared flood affected in 2011. Some towns were wiped off the map. That included many inner city Brisbane Suburbs, despite the fact that Dams were built to mitigate future floods after the 1974 floods.
- Many homes were flood affected twice in 2011 in north coastal areas of Queensland.
- Floods affected homes on Victoria and South Australia.
- Bushfires have consumed 70 homes in Perth
- Cyclone Yasi damaged homes in many towns in North Queensland.
Brasil. Floods washed away or destroyed homes in Brasil
US. Under the weight of record snows, roofs have collapsed under record snows in homes, barns, factories and Sport Stadiums.
So called 100 year storms are happening every ten years due to climate change
Engineers, house designers and insurers are already facing these questions as 100 year weather events seem to be happening every ten years, and some weather events and bushfire temperatures have never been seen before that make them uncontrollable.
Reinsurance has seen what thy say are the climate change results
According to Munich Re, one of the world’s largest Re-insurance companies, says climate-related events serious enough to cause property damage have risen significantly since 1980: extreme floods tripled and extreme windstorms nearly so.
How to Design and Build your home for a climate change future
Make no mistake, these recent events his will affect:
- How we build are homes for the future weather we can expect.
- Where we build homes in the future, and
- Where home building may be denied in the future.
If we choose to build in fire or flood prone areas, and are permitted to do so:
- What we will have to engineer for in home design for those eventualities and
- How much we will have to pay a premium on our insurance costs.
- Where insurance companies will refuse to insure for events in the future.
Possible realities for future home design and homeowners.
- Homeowners may be refused insurance in certain areas.
- Home builders denied permission to build their home in certain areas
- Local Government building standards to be beefed up and brought up to date to face the climate change realities, raising building costs.
- Possibility of existing buildings being retro fitted and raised with new stumping/stilt methods in flood prone areas, to higher than prior flood levels.
- Use fire resistant building materials and better building methods in fire prone areas.
The question they will have to ponder is what will the next 50 years bring, that we have yet to see, and how climate change will affect home design.
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Rick Adlam [HomeMate] has been working in the homebuilding since 1985 as a new home consultant with Iconic builder AV Jennings. He has also worked in home design consultancy with Dixon Homes, VillaWorld, Galaxy Homes, Merlin Homes, Simonds Homes, Award Homes and Orbit Homes. Rick currently consults in the development of Mr Mortgage for mortgage brokers and HomeMate for new home buyers
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