Podcast appearances and mentions of Ian L Mcharg

Dr. Carolyn Kousky & Dr. Billy Fleming are my guests on Episode 115 of Inside Ideas with Marc Buckley. Carolyn is Executive Director at the Wharton Risk Management and Decision Processes Center at the University of Pennsylvania, where she also directs the Policy Incubator. Carolyn research examines multiple aspects of disaster insurance markets, disaster finance, climate risk management, and policy approaches for increasing resilience. She has published numerous articles, reports, and book chapters on the economics and policy of climate risk and disaster insurance markets, and is routinely cited in media outlets including NPR, The New York Times, and The Financial Times, among many others. She is the recipient of the 2013 Tartufari International Prize from the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei. She is the vice-chair of the California Climate Insurance Working Group, a university fellow at Resources for the Future, a non-resident scholar at the Insurance Information Institute, and a member of the Roundtable on Risk and Resilience of Extreme Events at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. She has a BS in Earth Systems from Stanford University and a PhD in Public Policy from Harvard University. Billy Fleming is the Wilks Family Director of the Ian L. McHarg Center in the Weitzman School of Design, a senior fellow with Data for Progress, and co-director of the "climate + community project." His fellowship with Data for Progress has focused on the built environment impacts of climate change, and resulted most prominently in the publication of low-carbon public housing policy briefs tied to the “Green New Deal for Public Housing Act” introduced in 2019. In his role at the McHarg Center, Billy is co-editor of the forthcoming book An Adaptation Blueprint (Island Press, 2020), co-editor and co-curator of the book and now internationally-traveling exhibit Design With Nature Now (Lincoln, 2019), and author of the forthcoming Drowning America: The Nature and Politics of Adaptation (Penn Press, expected 2021). Billy is also the lead author of the recently published and widely acclaimed “The 2100 Project: An Atlas for the Green New Deal.” He is also a co-author of the Indivisible Guide (2016). A Blueprint for Coastal Adaptation: Uniting Design, Economics, and Policy (Publication Date: May 20, 2021) edited by Carolyn Kousky, Billy Fleming, and Alan M. Berger, identifies a bold new research and policy agenda for coastal adaptation and provides implementable options for coastal communities. https://islandpress.org/books/blueprint-coastal-adaptation

Wilks Family Director, Ian L. McHarg Center Billy Fleming is the Wilks Family Director of the Ian L. McHarg Center in the Weitzman School of Design, a senior fellow with Data for Progress, and co-director of the "climate + community project." His fellowship with Data for Progress has focused on the built environment impacts of climate change, and resulted most prominently in the publication of low-carbon public housing policy briefs tied to the “Green New Deal for Public Housing Act” introduced in 2019. In his role at the McHarg Center, Billy is co-editor of the forthcoming book An Adaptation Blueprint (Island Press, 2020), co-editor and co-curator of the book and now internationally-traveling exhibit Design With Nature Now (Lincoln, 2019), and author of the forthcoming Drowning America: The Nature and Politics of Adaptation (Penn Press, expected 2021). Billy is also the lead author of the recently published and widely acclaimed “The 2100 Project: An Atlas for the Green New Deal.” He is also a co-author of the Indivisible Guide (2016). Along with Daniel Aldana Cohen, Billy co-directs the climate + community project (ccp), which works to connect the demands of the climate justice movement to the policy development process. ccp aim to do this by developing new, investment-forward public policy proposals under the framework of the Decade of the Green New Deal that target the intersection of climate justice and the built environment. Its focus has been on foregrounding the role of public housing, public schools, public transportation, public power, public land, and public works in local, state, national, and international climate policy discourse. This work has already resulted in applied policy research and model legislation in the housing, schools, transportation, and electricity sectors, filling a critical gap between the demands of the climate justice movement, the appetite for substantial new policy content from sitting legislators, and the desire of a rising generation of scholars to contribute to their work (including Olufemi Taiwo, Akira Drake Rodridguez, Yonah Freemark, Thea Riofrancos, and Shalanda Baker). His writing on climate, disaster, and design has also been published in The Guardian, The Atlantic, CityLab, Dissent Magazine, Houston Chronicle, Jacobin, Places Journal, and Science for the People Magazine, and he’s frequently asked to weigh in on the infrastructure and built environment implications of climate change, as well as candidate and congressional climate plans, by major climate reporters and congressional staff. His research has been supported by grants from the Lincoln Institute for Land Policy, Pew Center for Arts and Heritage, William Penn Foundation,Summit Foundation, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Hewlett Foundation, and by a variety of sponsors in the design and building industry. Prior to joining Penn, he worked as a landscape architect, city planner, organizer, and, later, in the Obama Administration’s White House Domestic Policy Council. He holds a bachelor of landscape architecture (University of Arkansas), master of community and regional planning (University of Texas), and a doctorate of city and regional planning (University of Pennsylvania).

Climate change, and policies to address it, will change where Americans live and work, and produce energy and food. Two environmental designers discuss an atlas of the country’s future.---A year ago, Democratic members of Congress introduced a resolution to address climate change and economic inequality, with a plan that promises to fundamentally alter Americans’ relationship to their natural and built environments. That vision, the Green New Deal, recalls an earlier bold plan of action for the country at a time of crisis.Nearly 90 years ago the original New Deal created vast public works projects to create jobs during the Great Depression. But its legacy transcends economic recovery. Public works projects realized the goal of universal electrification, built highways to speed future growth, and paved the way for migration to the suburbs and from old industrial centers to new. Along the way, the New Deal fundamentally altered the human map of the United States.Today’s Green New Deal proposes to do something similar. If it comes to pass, it’s likely to change where many Americans live, and how they make their living.Guests Alexandra Lillehei and Billy Fleming of the University of Pennsylvania’s Ian L. McHarg Center for Urbanism and Design talk about what a future map of America, shaped by climate change and a Green New Deal, might look like. The two have been instrumental in a new initiative called The 2100 Project: An Atlas for the Green New Deal. Through maps, the project envisions changes in population distribution, energy production and agricultural activity over the course of this century.Related Content De-Abstracting Climate Change https://kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/blog/2020/05/19/de-abstracting-climate-changeBalancing Renewable Energy Goals with Community Interests https://kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/policy-digests/balancing-renewable-energy-goals-community-interests Changing Tides: Public Attitudes on Climate Change and Climate Migration https://kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/policy-digests/changing-tides

As sea levels rise, nuisance flooding is the first wave of assault on coastal cities. Can we protect our coasts from inundation, or is retreat inevitable? --- Jeff Goodell, author of the New York Times award-winning book, The Water Will Come: Rising Seas, Sinking Cities, and the Remaking of the Civilized World, talks about the impact of rising seas on America’s coastal centers in the decades to come. Will innovative engineering allow cities and towns to be protected, and at what cost? Or, will the seas prevail, leaving some areas abandoned? Billy Fleming, research director for the Ian L. McHarg Center at the Penn School of Design and an expert on climate adaptation planning, weighs in as well. The U.S. government estimates that sea levels will rise by two feet by the middle of this century due to a warming climate. Already the impact of higher water is being felt in points around the country. In many coastal communities, nuisance flooding has become the predictable norm. Miami Beach is spending half a billion dollars to elevate roads and install pumps in an effort to stay dry. And Houston, New York, and New Orleans, all cities that are just feet above sea level, have recently seen unprecedented and devastating flooding. Goodell and Fleming look at the political and human costs of taking action. Jeff Goodell is a contributing editor with Rolling Stone magazine, where his writing focuses on environmental and climate issues. Last year he published his sixth book, The Water Will Come: Rising Seas, Sinking Cities, and the Remaking of the Civilized World, which earned a Critics’ Top Book award from the New York Times. Billy Fleming is research director for the Ian L. McHarg Center at the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Design. His research focuses on climate adaptation planning along the U.S. coast. Related Content Water Issues in California https://kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/policy-digests/water-issues-california Hot Topics on Climate Change https://kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/policy-digests/hot-topics-climate-change

The U.S. government has spent hundreds of billions of dollars over the past decade to rebuild coastal cities and towns following hurricanes, yet coastlines remain vulnerable to repeat disaster. Two Penn urban policy experts discuss coastal resiliency and the process by which government allocates recovery funds. -- Federal spending on hurricane disaster relief has risen dramatically since Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans in 2005. Federal agencies have paid out $200 billion dollars for coastal recovery since. And, more recently, Texas governor Greg Abbott projected that recovery from Hurricane Harvey could total $150 billion or more. As spending rises, the need to ensure that coastal towns and cities are more resilient to future, repeat disasters has come to the forefront. And, with much of the nation’s oil refining and chemical industry located in low lying coastal areas, the challenge includes fortifying energy infrastructure, and protecting communities from toxic hazards. Ellen Neises and Billy Fleming, urban policy experts at the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Design, discuss the process government uses to select and fund recovery projects, and how coastal areas can be made more resilient. Ellen Neises is Executive Director of Penn Praxis, the center for Applied Research and Planning at the University of Pennsylvania School of Design. Her recent work has focused on developing solutions to rebuild, protect and improve cities hit by Hurricane Sandy. Billy Fleming is Research Coordinator for the Ian L. McHarg Center at the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Design, where his research focuses on climate adaptation planning along the U.S. coast. During the Obama Administration, he worked on urban policy development on the White House Domestic Policy Council. Related Content Power Down in Puerto Rico: http://kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/blog/2017/09/28/power-down-puerto-rico Hot Topics on Climate Change: http://kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/policy-digests/hot-topics-climate-change Comparative Pathways to Regional Energy Transition: http://kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/pathways Aligning Global Logic with Local Need: http://kleinmanenergy.upenn.edu/policy-digests/aligning-local-logic-global-need