After a record 22 billion-dollar disasters in 2020, it's time to overhaul US disaster policy – here's how
NOAA released its list of climate and weather disasters that cost the nation more than $1 billion each. Like many climate and weather events this past year, it shattered the record.
Jan. 8, 2021 • ~11 min
climate-change policy construction floods hurricanes storms global-warming natural-disasters wildfires government disaster-risk fema building disaster-management land-use building-codes 2020
After a record 22 billion-dollar disasters in 2020, it's time to make US disaster policy more effective and equitable – here's how
NOAA released its list of climate and weather disasters that cost the nation more than $1 billion each. Like many climate and weather events this past year, it shattered the record.
Jan. 8, 2021 • ~11 min
policy construction floods hurricanes storms natural-disasters wildfires government disaster-risk fema building disaster-management land-use building-codes 2020
HS2: Moving ancient woodland habitat for rail line flawed, ecologists say
Soil is being moved to new sites but ecologists question whether the process is effective.
Oct. 23, 2020 • ~6 min
environment conservation construction-industry hs2 rail-travel woodland high-speed-rail
Plastics could help build a sustainable future – here's how
Plastics are strong, durable, waterproof, lightweight, easy to mould, and recyclable – all key properties for construction materials.
Aug. 12, 2020 • ~8 min
interdisciplinarity plastic circular-economy building plastic-waste construction-materials
Culverts – the major threat to fish you've probably never heard of
Fish need to cross roads too. But the tunnels built to channel rivers under roads and railways can block their migrations.
Aug. 6, 2020 • ~6 min
biodiversity fish construction dams rivers freshwater-biology roads eels
Making the most of a tree epidemic
With trees infested by the emerald ash borer deemed essentially worthless, a team of designers wanted to see if the decaying wood could be repurposed as a building material.
Aug. 4, 2020 • ~7 min
architecture carbon construction trees design ash
JCB electric digger wins top MacRobert engineering prize
An all-electric construction vehicle from the Staffordshire firm wins this year's MacRobert Award.
July 9, 2020 • ~2 min
engineering construction-industry bradford
Algorithms are designing better buildings
Algorithms can now work out the best ways to lay out rooms, construct buildings and even change them over time to meet user needs.
June 18, 2020 • ~7 min
algorithm buildings design construction-industry building-design architeture
Discerning the texture of urban resilience
MIT Concrete Sustainability Hub researchers are investigating how the layouts, or textures, of cities influence extreme weather events.
March 30, 2020 • ~10 min
cities sustainability climate-change architecture construction hurricanes natural-disasters research school-of-engineering urban-studies-and-planning civil-and-environmental-engineering concrete-sustainability-hub
Buildings grown by bacteria -- new research is finding ways to turn cells into mini-factories for materials
Researchers are turning microbes into microscopic construction crews by altering their DNA to make them produce building materials. The work could lead to more sustainable buildings.
March 23, 2020 • ~7 min
sustainability climate-change biology synthetic-biology construction infrastructure carbon-dioxide-co2 polymers minerals built-environment material-science buildings cyanobacteria
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