ArticleBody:This story was originally published by Grist. Sign up for Grist’s weekly newsletter here. When the Federal Emergency Management Agency spends millions of dollars to help rebuild schools and hospitals after a hurricane, it tries to make the community more resilient than it was before the storm. If the agency pays to rebuild a school or a town hall, for example, it might elevate the building above the floodplain, lowering the odds that it will get submerged again.
is expanding its definition of the floodplain, following an executive order from President Joe Biden that forced government agencies to tighten rules about how they respond to the increasing risk of floods. In a significant shift, the new standard will require the agency to factor in the impact of climate change on future flood risk when it decides where and how it’s safe to build.
will build farther from the water wherever possible and will raise structures on stilts and pilings when it can’t pull back from the coast. “The federal government really has a duty to account for a future flood risk when it’s providing funding to build or rebuild homes or infrastructure, because it’s using taxpayer dollars,” said Joel Scata, a senior attorney at the nonprofit Natural Resources Defense Council and an expert on flood policy.