Adapting to climate change: An evidence-based approach to the built environment
March 12, 2025
Adapting our built environment to withstand the impacts of climate change has become as important as mitigating impacts and reaching net zero
Stark reminders of how our climate is changing are more and more frequent. From the shocking wildfires around Los Angeles, California, to heavy flooding and storms across the UK. These incidents are rooted in changing weather patterns.
AXA’s latest Climate Risks report has some key takeaways relating to this. It suggests properties most at risk from flooding could incur costs exceeding £818 million by 2055. The report also highlights that UK cities like London, Birmingham, and Sheffield are vulnerable to both flooding and heat.
There is a broad understanding of net zero commitments, demonstrated by strategies to cut energy use, reduce emissions, and meet stated targets. However, the attention paid to understanding current and future risks from our climate and adapting to climate change is less developed. Short-term commercial gains are often given the priority. Too often, it seems, boardrooms hold the view that addressing the challenge of adapting to climate change can wait for another day. There is a degree of ‘out of sight, out of mind’ thinking. Although with flooding in the UK becoming more commonplace, the issue is arguably more visible than ever before.
As with any business decision, there are things you can focus on to get better results. So, where should we direct our attention? Planning, interpreting data-driven evidence, and weighing up the costs of proposed actions against potential benefits. This makes preparing for and adapting to climate change—given the likely impacts on people, buildings, and infrastructure—as relevant as efforts to decarbonise assets and supply chains.
Organisations with estates recognise the impact on productivity if buildings are impacted by climate change. (Photo: Quintin Lake Photography, Architect: Roberts Limbrick Architects)
In 2024, I spoke at the industry-leading conference UKREiiF. My topic? The importance of understanding likely impacts to buildings from long-term climate change. My experience with universities, healthcare trusts, and infrastructure providers confirms that they know what’s coming. They recognise that if buildings are affected by climate change it will impact productivity and an ability to support their users. It’s why I prescribe a data-led approach to understand likely impacts and how to adapt and be resilient to change.
The impacts that drive action
We support clients on their journey to understanding climate risk and adapting to climate change. What we see is a consistent set of reasons driving their need to address physical climate risks and create resilience.
The impact of business interruption—especially financial loss—is the number one concern. Also of priority are the cost and ability to secure insurance and the impact on employees’ health and wellbeing from buildings affected by changing climate patterns. And, finally, is the ability to attract and retain people on a site or to an organisation. No one wants to work in a building known to overheat.
For investors, these threats extend to the major financial implications of stranded assets. These are buildings adversely affected by climate change, which have lost value or are no longer fit for purpose before the end of their expected useful life. This makes them unmarketable.
In our team’s experience, businesses, public bodies, and investors are looking for an evidence-based approach. It’s one that helps identify the risks to built assets and infrastructure from a changing climate. And they want a roadmap for adapting to climate change so that buildings have long-term viable use.
The impact of business interruption is the number one concern as we address climate change. (Photo/Architect: AHR)
A data-led approach in adapting to climate change
In looking at likely climate risk, the important point to hold in mind is that different climatic issues will affect parts of a building and an estate in various ways. Add to that, each physical risk will have a specific threshold on different buildings, in different locations, over which the risk becomes a reality. It’s nuanced, which makes the data gathering and analysis a crucial stage in planning a strategy for adapting to climate change.
Each part of a building and its wider environment is at risk from different climatic impacts. For example, foundations are threatened by subsidence depending on soil types, rainfall, and changes to water tables. Building materials will deteriorate at varying speeds. This depends on changes to rainfall and temperature. The impact is different for roofs, windows, interiors, and structural layouts. Surface-water flooding or wind microclimates can make pedestrian access to a building unsafe.
There needs to be an understanding of the impact of these physical risks—from heat stress and flooding to storms and extreme precipitation. The UK Green Building Council helped us take a step forward in this area in 2021. It was then that it published its framework for measuring and reporting of climate-related physical risks to built assets.
This is now industry-accepted guidance for organisations that are completing a risk analysis at an asset level. It has formed the backbone of our analysis for clients of the risks they may face both now and in the future. For asset-owning organisations, like institutional investors, it helps address the requirements of different reporting standards. As an example, the International Financial Reporting Standards S1 and S2. These require that we measure and report physical and financial climate-related risks
In our work with clients, we examine specific locations. This is supported by building survey data gathered through on-site walk-rounds and information from estates and facilities teams. We combine this with local and regional UK Climate Projections 2018 (UKCP18) data.
Each part of a building and its wider environment is at risk from different climatic impacts.
This helps us create a picture of both specific buildings and entire estates. For example, let’s look in on our work on the Jubilee Campus at the University of Nottingham. This extended to two further campuses for the university. It identifies the resilience of each type of building to different climatic impacts of varying extremes. This analysis is further built out into short-term (up to 2030), medium-term (2031–50), and long-term (2051–2080) risk. And it’s based on different scenarios of likely climate impact from the diverse types of physical risks.
Through a series of colour-coded risk reports, we’ve helped clients, such as the University of Nottingham, quickly identify which buildings are most susceptible to extreme events and changing climatic patterns. They can also see the thresholds and timelines involved. It’s a data-led process that sharpens attention to risk and helps build a strategy for adapting to climate change.
Strategies for adapting to climate change
Having identified the buildings most at risk, the process for adapting to climate change moves into optioneering. Then, we put forward potential interventions to build resilience.
The adaptations will be shaped by a detailed engineering assessment, modelling, and cost/benefit analysis. This will determine the most appropriate solutions given the budget, time, and business impact.
Mapping out risks across an entire estate, with high-level adaptation recommendations, helps clients get a complete picture. Then, it can be shared that with their leadership and financial teams. It will highlight likely risk, vulnerability, and impact. For the University of Nottingham, we helped the estates and capital projects teams consider where to focus first.
Different climatic issues will affect various parts of a building. (Photo/Architect: AHR)
Budget holders can then make informed decisions on where to prioritise action. We can address critical assets with adaptive, engineering-led responses. Examples might include assets critical to maintaining infrastructure or processes that affect supply chains and customers.
We need a similar approach and strategy for adapting to climate change when planning new buildings. Knowing the likely long-term climatic patterns of a geographical area—and the impact on buildings—is now a more important factor in the due diligence process for site development.
Our data-led climate and risk studies can help inform development strategies. We found this while working for a leading residential developer on a 1,200-home site in the Midlands that had a concern around water shortages. We were able to influence the development strategy to consider water use.
For example, we focused on:
- Road access points to avoid likely areas of flood.
- The use of fire-resistant plants to buffer occupied areas.
- The location of key infrastructure. For example, energy and communication systems could be placed in areas less likely to be impacted by long-term climatic changes.
Adaptation can achieve so much
It’s important we start by understanding physical climate risk. As we create a strategy for adapting to climate change, we also can tackle decarbonisation and improve energy efficiency. We do this through an engineering-design led process. From a perspective of reducing cost, time, and disruption, it’s more efficient to tackle all relevant issues on a building at the same time. Indeed, many adaptation measures will be ‘low cost, low regret’—but they will also address climate mitigation.
The risk of doing nothing can be significantly outweighed by the impacts on business continuity in the face of changing climatic conditions. For this reason, an informed, data-evidenced approach is key to adapting and building resilience in the face of increasing change.