Maximizing Benefits: Strategies for Community Resilience

American communities are facing growing and shifting climate risks. The evidence is in the growing costs of disasters which soared to more than $300 billion in 2017, breaking 2005’s record of $219 billion, according to NOAA data. Underlying these headline-making disasters are the gradual impacts of climate change that can further stretch cities’ already thin financial resources and staff time, undercutting other priorities. In anticipation of these challenges, the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions developed a set of briefs we call Maximizing Benefits: Strategies for Community Resilience. The five briefs presented in this compendium focus on extreme heat and heatwaves, flash flooding, drought, wildfire, and power outages, which are caused by a number of physical climate impacts.