Name: Impact Initiative 2024: Building Climate-Ready Cities
Uploaded: 2024-10-08
Duration: 17 min 52 s
Description: Andre Dickens, Mayor, Atlanta Ali Zaidi, White House National Climate Advisor Moderator: Sheryl Estrada, Senior Writer, Finance, Fortune

Andre Dickens, Mayor, Atlanta Ali Zaidi, White House National Climate Advisor Moderator: Sheryl Estrada, Senior Writer, Finance, Fortune 

Impact Initiative 2024: Building Climate-Ready Cities

Photography by Rebecca Greenfield/Fortune

Conferences

Hey, hi there. Hi, everyone. Thanks for joining us and may I thank you for hosting us in your great city. Yeah, absolutely. Thank you all for being here. Welcome to Atlanta. Enjoy our great city, spend lots of money and uh ok, thank you. Um Ali, I'd like to start the conversation off with you. Um Some of the same areas hit hard by Helene to see flooding again by hurricane Milton. So I'm expected to make landfall as early as Thursday. What steps has the administration taken to bolster climate resilience? Well, first of all, um grateful to be with you and this storm is just catastrophic uh overnight, essentially charging up to a category five. and you see more and more storms draw their fury from a Gulf of Mexico that is warmer and that's directly related to climate change. Um You know, we have pre positioned assets uh throughout the whole federal government, uh shoulder to shoulder with state and local officials to take on what the impacts will be from this storm and the next one. But to your point, uh it's really important for us to be in the long game of adapting our cities and our rural areas to this new reality. So when I think about climate resilience, especially in the face of flood, you know, in the previous administration, they had rolled back these things called flood risk standards. Uh basic minimum guidelines that when you build infrastructure using taxpayer dollars, how high do you build it? Uh In this administration, not only did we uh go and undo that reversal, we actually integrated climate informed science into a new set of flood risk standards. So thing number one is when you spend federal bucks, uh make sure you build it in a way that uh responds to what we know about the risk in front of us, but that's for things going forward. How do you improve the things that are already built all around us? And there in the form of the bipartisan infrastructure law, we made the biggest investment and resilience in the country and very specifically what that means is money to raise roads and bridges. So they don't wash away during a storm. Uh with a particular mind to things like evacuation routes that we have funded in the State of Florida, for example, through the infrastructure law. Well, before a storm showed up so that those evacuation routes are available, hardening our grid is a second strategy that I think is absolutely essential to the success of future um uh cities going forward because uh we have whether it's a hospital or a uh uh senior center or it's the command center or it's frankly, the water treatment plant, all of it plugs into our grid. So if the grid gets washed out, you have a very big problem. Uh And that's why we're investing in increased transmission capacity, strengthening the substation assets. Um So those don't flood when a storm or storm surge passes through and then also getting after the opportunity that distributed energy represents, so I could go on and on. But I think it's about codes. It's about standard. It's about building new things smarter and upgrading older built environments uh to meet the test of the climate crisis. Thank you, Ali. Um I wanted to ask you Mayor Dickens uh hurricane, he made landfall September 26th in Florida, eventually moving into parts of Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia and Tennessee Metro Atlanta was spared most of the storm. Can you tell us the approach of your office of emergency preparedness during this time? Yeah, absolutely. We didn't know what was going to happen. So we prepared for the worst, right. So we of course, seeing this big storm Helene coming through uh the Gulf of Mexico, a lot of attention was on Florida, the Tallahassee area and thinking that southern Georgia would get it, but it never stopped. It just kept going all the way up to Appalachia, to North Carolina, South Carolina. And um but it made a turn uh just as it was coming towards metro Atlanta and it went eastern easterly and up, uh just literally circled around Atlanta. So we got a lot of flooding, a lot of wind but not as much as we would have received. Had we've been on that direct path, but we prepared. Um, the, the day we knew it was coming. Two days earlier, we started to prepare as heavy rains were in Atlanta and the heavy rains persisted for days. And so we knew that if the hurricane did come, if heavy winds came, the ground was going to be so soft that the trees would start to fall. And we have a lot of power lines here that if the trees fall, then that means that the power grid is now affected in people's ability, uh whether they're uh medical devices that are in their homes, of course, their cell phones and other things. So we began to prepare um these type of events, you have to be coordinate, you have to have a lot of collaboration and then communications is key. And I think that in order to get it right, you have to really, really uh have a good communications network with your television, but also with social media, with the devices on people's phones and the pres conversations. Atlanta is very hilly as you may as you may know, we have with the city of 1000 hills has been said. Um and so low lying areas, collect water in normal heavy rain events, uh then a thunderstorm, but something that's the magnitude of a hurricane we had to prepare ahead of time. So communication was telling people to move their cars to higher ground. Some houses have hills and we want you to put your car at the highest point. We want you to put your uh don't have your birth certificate, social security number and your uh life insurance in that little Nike shoe box in the basement that sometimes floods, right? So you have to tell people these things. And then the other coordinations was key to make sure we went and cleaned out all of the storm drains every day is particularly in areas that we know are low lying areas in the city, like where our college students are at. Clark, Atlanta, Atlanta University Center, some other low lying areas that flooded in 2008, flooded in 2002. So we looked at history as a guide to say these areas flood in certain conditions. So we need to get ahead of it. Luckily, those areas didn't flood uh as bad. We did have some areas that did the creeks and the um and the river did get a really high level. So the other part of our plan, the collaboration working with Georgia Power and having all of our agency relationships in order F ma Jima, et cetera. Um I'd like to say that we came through that storm pretty well. We lost 6% power, uh 6% of the residents lost power for some period of time due to down power lines. About 220 trees fell down. And we had our emergency crews on standby. Atlanta Fire Rescue Department um had to get them boats to get some people in some apartments that were very low lying and they had to be rescued. They were trying to drive in the, in the vehicles and the floodwaters just came over them. And so no one lost life, but we were able to coordinate in a way to take a, take boats onto this property to be able to get people. So, um you know, we learned a lot in this exercise as we are now experiencing what's in the Gulf. Uh Right now, unfortunately, while it looks like it's going to go across Florida, we don't take any chances. We're collaborating right now. Um And, and the last thing I'll say is part of our collaboration is a whole of government approach. Every single department head that may have thought they weren't directly into the flood mitigation, public safety. Everybody, we had uh routine calls every three hours and we stood up our joint operation center. We have a room about this size with TV S and monitors and communication devices that the first the seconds, the thirds and the department all rotate every eight hour shift. Um And we treat it as though it's um uh you know, uh operation if you will for um everybody, 311911 parks and recreation. Having to say, when are we going to close? Um After after school programs, are we gonna make sure they're closed today? Um And uh even mayor's office of special events, I'm doing ribbon cuttings and all those things. You have to give advance notice that these things are canceled and you should cancel yours too. People take their cues from the government. So we were making sure that we sent messaging out to our Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce and our school system and others saying we're not working in person to, you know, the next uh tomorrow, what have you, we're gonna work remotely but you know, emergency personnel will be on standby and that helped clear the roads as well. Oh, this is amazing. Uh The information you're sharing with us. Um I was wondering as you were speaking, are there any learnings or best practices from this experience that you plan to take into a potential other catastrophes? Yeah, it don't take any storm for granted. It's um you know, when they start talking about it on the weather channel, on the news, if it's in the Gulf, our office of emergency preparedness starts to have weather forecasts. We start having screens available for us to watch this storm because they shift. They, they can make, you know, uh rapid shifts or even shifts that are undetermined how uh how large they're going to be. Um, and so don't take any storm for granted, make sure that you stay ready. So you don't have to get ready in some kind of, you know, uh, some kind of format that's not planned. You want to be ahead of it, but it's also to make sure that people have some self resiliency. Government has a tremendous role and local government, people come to local government for everything, right? Um And you have to know that people are going to ask me about postal service, right? People are going to ask me about their food stamp, their snap their whatever and that's not a local function, but I have to be aware of it. People are gonna ask me, you know about um a number of things, right? So it's being prepared, being collaborative is so important. I have to know in government, the local government, the ones that they see in the grocery store every day, the ones that they um hang out with, they, they come to us first. And so we have to know everything uh have a good feel for what weather patterns are, be able to communicate with the power companies with the uh various entities that help us. But everybody has to have some self resiliency. We think about our critical infrastructure, which are our hospitals, our airport, our rail system, um the various uh water systems. But we also think about our uh our you know, challenged communities, those that are experiencing homelessness, our seniors and knows how do we get, make sure they have provisions. Is there water in this senior center? Do we have the ability to get them water? Is there a battery backup at the senior center? We have to bring all of the people experiencing homelessness in, into our shelters, making sure there's enough shelter beds, et cetera. So we did all of that. Um And luckily most of it wasn't as necessary because the storm changed. But then a few days later, there was a uh a biolab that had this chemical uh this, this chemical fire. So it put chlorine in the air. So we had to protect people a week later, it wasn't in the city of Atlanta. It was, you know, 50 miles away, but we share the same air, we share the same water. We are in 11 community. Now what affects one directly affects another indirectly as Doctor King will say. So having self resiliency. So we have now these packages that we're sharing people with people to say in your home, we should at least have these things because we might, can't get to you in five minutes like we can on a sunny day, we might, can't get to you in 10 minutes or 20 minutes. Have these things prepare these things. So that's part of our initial communication and particularly to our vulnerable population like our senior citizens. And those that are in our homeless shelters. Thank you for sharing that mayor. Um Ali, I wanted to ask you as the mayor has explained uh a lot of the measures that he's taking on a local level. How does the federal uh government partner with uh local government for some of these initiatives like educating uh citizens on, on, on best practices for their homes to endure uh climate events and things of that sort. Well, the, the mayor just walked through, I think the master class of what leadership looks like on the climate crisis. Um And you know, tell me for you. That's awesome. Thank you. Thank you. Um Look, you know, we're hearing about what he's done in just the last week or two. But let me say the reason he's able, I think to pass the ball around to play that point guard function on the ground is because right out of the gate, he established an office of sustainability and resilience in his city hall. So one of the things we've been trying to do with mayors and local leaders around the country is to have them establish that capability, that capacity. Sure, everybody in local government uh or federal government for that matter is now for better or worse in the climate business. We are all uh enveloped in the crisis, but you need a capacity, a central clearing house uh that gets information out uh even to the government. Uh so that folks are doing what they need to. So that's thing number one that we've been trying to do is work with local governments to build their capacity to coordinate themselves. The second is, you know, again, he talked about uh in this very colloquial way uh about going and clearing out the, the storms, uh the storm gutters, uh making sure that the absorption capability uh for these new precipitation patterns that are potentially deadly, um that they got out in front of it. How do you do that? The way you do it is by harnessing the data we now have available that helps us try to pinpoint what those risk spots are. So we launched this new tool called camera uh two years ago using uh new satellite data and new climate projections through our uh weather agency through NOA. And it's designed specifically so that local leaders can actually take that information and then use it to deploy their resources more effectively. So the second thing we've been trying to do is workshop these data tools that we have available with local leaders so that they can do exactly the use case. Uh The mayor laid out, take the data from uh our scientists and then translate it into resource deployment that's smarter and more effective. The third thing is trying to integrate the use of uh more technology to this adaptation challenge. Uh I think for a really long time, we've looked at the root cause part of climate change, right, the solar panels, uh the electric rivian that the mayor drives, um getting the pollution out of the sky that causes the climate change. Um But we've got to apply that same technology innovation to the resilience challenge, which is why we're actually bringing together innovators who are deploying drones to figure out where those power lines are, maybe the most vulnerable issues spot that early. Uh figure out how uh the mayor talked about vegetation management that is a massive issue around the country. Um But we now have folks actually using satellite data and artificial intelligence to spot where that vegetation mismanagement is most likely to cause um a down uh in the grid go and search solutions to that place. So I think what we uh have been trying to do is really to get all of these tools in the hands of local leaders. And of course, recognize that a big part of it all is investment um in Georgia, we've invested 2 million bucks for culverts in those uh types of geographies that uh the mayor is talking about so that the water can flow more effectively and not uh pull up and cause a big problem. Um You've got to invest in the raising of the roads and the hardening of the infrastructure. So it's uh helping them build the capacity, helping get the data and tools and the best practices and then helping out with the resources. Thank you. I think that's a good ending point. You need the technology, you need the resources and the investment. Um I want to thank you both for being here with us today. Thank you for sharing your insight. Thank you so much.