ALL GOVERNMENT AGENCIES HANDING OUT FEDERAL AID TO INCORPORATE STRICTER BUILDING REQUIREMENTS THAT TAKE SEA-LEVEL RISE INTO ACCOUNT
President Barack Obama has issued an executive order directing
all government agencies handing out federal aid to incorporate stricter
building requirements that take sea-level rise into account. The move is aimed
at making residents in coastal areas safer from storms like Sandy, as well as
ensuring that taxpayer money is spent wisely.
Planners and environmentalists have long lamented that the
FEMA flood maps -- which dictated the construction standards for Sandy victims
rebuilding along the coast -- only considered historical flood damage in requiring
them to build to the 100-year flood height (a flood that has a 1 percent chance
of occurring annually), but did not take into account future risks pertaining
to climate change or potentially more severe storms. Most other government
agencies similarly failed to incorporate climate predictions in their planning
efforts.
As such, Friday’s announcement is being viewed as an
important policy shift, with one FEMA official tweeting that it’s “the most
significant action by a president to address the flood resilience of the
nation” in nearly 40 years. Policy observers here in New Jersey also said
they’re thrilled by the news.
While it won’t affect federal flood insurance standards or
rates, Friday’s announcement will affect homeowners who receive federal funding
through the Small Business Administration or the U.S. Department of Housing and
Urban Development to build new homes along the coast or conduct substantial
repairs after future disasters. Effectively, the order means they’ll have to
elevate at least 2 feet above the the current FEMA requirements. Alternatively,
they have to build to the more restrictive 500-year flood elevation (defined by
the height that floodwaters would reach during a more severe storm that has a
0.2-percent annual chance) or use another method “informed by best-available,
actionable climate science.”
Towns and cities that use federal money to build roads and
other infrastructure in flood zones will face similar requirements, and the
regulations for critical facilities like hospitals and evacuation centers will
be even more stringent, mandating an additional 3 feet above the 100-year
floodplain.
The order does not apply to preexisting structures or
infrastructure unless they’re substantially damaged in a subsequent natural
disaster, and officials say it should not affect the spending of Sandy aid
money.
The new standard has been in the works for the past year,
and it fulfills recommendations of both the president’s Hurricane Sandy
Rebuilding Task Forceand his Climate Action Plan in ensuring that federally
funded projects are built to better withstand future storms and last as long as
they are intended to last. It comes days after the release of a U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers report that warned of the impact of sea level rise,
including a particular focus on flooding threats to the New York-New Jersey
harbor estuary and New Jersey’s back bays.
The announcement was welcomed by John Miller, Legislative
Committee Chair at the New Jersey Association for Floodplain Management.
“This is a huge step in the right direction, avoiding future
losses,” he said. “I think what you’re seeing in this executive order is some
of the learning that came out of the Sandy experience and acknowledging future
conditions are not going to necessarily be what we had in the past. If the
federal government is investing in these things, what they’re saying is, ‘We
want more insurance in what we’re building. We want a higher factor of safety
in its construction.’”
Chris Sturm, senior policy director at the planning-advocacy
group NJ Future, called it a “commonsense update that shows that the federal
government is catching up to our new understanding of flood risks.”
“You hear all the time that people are building to higher
elevations than is required because the marginal cost is not very big,” she
added. “So it’s only prudent to make sure while you’re doing it that you’re
doing it right.”
Indeed, a study commissioned by FEMA several years
ago found that the cost of raising a home a few additional feet at the time of
initial construction only adds up to 1 percent to the overall building cost for
each extra foot the structure is raised. So while the new standard could
provide magnitudes of added safety and cost-savings over the long-run,
officials say it won’t actually cost homeowners that much more to implement.
The Association of State Floodplain Managers -- the national
group to which Miller belongs -- also issued a news release saying it supported
the Obama administration’s efforts.
“To ignore the rising trends in flood damages -- now
exceeding $10 billion per year -- and stay with the status quo [would be] to
accept that it is better to repeatedly waste taxpayer money repairing
flood-damaged facilities that are not resilient to future flood risks,” it
said.
According to Professor Richard Lathrop, who runs the Walton
Center for Remote Sensing and Spatial Analysis at the Rutgers Climate Institute
(and who stated he was not speaking on behalf of the university or any of his
colleagues), scientists have calculated an 85 percent chance that sea levels
along the Jersey Shore will rise more than one foot by the middle of the
century, and an 8 percent chance that they could exceed two feet. So he noted
the new federal standards are within the bounds of the higher end of those
projections.
“However, for certain types of infrastructure,
decision-makers may want to take a longer-term view and plan for the even higher
sea levels projected for 2100,” he said. By that time, scientists predict
waters could rise as much as three-and-a-half feet higher than
current levels.
“Our building stock is lasting for 150 years for
residential, single-family structures, so what we build now will have to last
for many years ahead,” Miller agreed. He noted these are merely minimum
standards, and that communities and utilities that think they’re not high
enough will always have the option of enforcing even stricter requirements, a
move that would be encouraged by the federal government.
Prior to this announcement, 10 municipalities along New
Jersey’s coast had already enacted local ordinances requiring that two extra
feet be included in all new flood-zone construction, and Tuckerton and Monmouth
Beach currently require a 3-foot buffer.
While the announcement was made on Friday, it will not take
effect for several months. The White House is gathering public comments over
the next 60 days, and individual government agencies will then be given time to
determine how to incorporate the new standard into their own rules and
regulations, so the precise mechanics of how it will be implemented have yet to
be determined.
