Designing for Natural Hazards: Resilience Guides for Builders and Developers

John B. Peavey
Nay B. Shah
Chinedu Moneke
Kevin Kauffman
Elina Thapa
Home Innovation Research Labs

Home Innovation Research Labs (Home Innovation) proposed to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development a research project to create a set of practical, actionable guidelines for builders and developers to follow in the design and construction of residential buildings, neighborhoods, and accessory structures in a manner that could improve residential resilience and integrate resiliency throughout an entire community. The Designing for Natural Hazards guides accomplish that task by providing technical content in a straightforward manner that is easy for laypeople to understand. They also offer references so design professionals, builders, developers, and public officials can dive more deeply into the necessary details. The guides are segmented into five volumes, each focusing on a specific natural hazard type: wind, water, fire, earth, and auxiliary. The guides differ from other resiliency programs and resources because they do not constitute a prescriptive program or suggest lists of improvements. Instead, the resilience guides are designed to be flexible and thereby let a user focus on either a single resilient construction practice or multiple resilient construction practices, depending on the user’s specific needs.