ERIS

The Environmental Research Institute of the States

resilience

Equitable Resilience Builder

EPA’s Equitable Resilience Builder (ERB) is a scientific tool developed using human-centered design and engages community members in resilience planning to generate solutions that advance equity. The tool contains activities for listening to local voices (trauma-informed engagement strategies, storytelling, participatory mapping) and conducting collaborative assessment of hazards, resilience and equity, to build community connections and identify actions to strengthen resilience in ways that address the needs of those made vulnerable by social and environmental inequalities. This presentation will provide an overview of the ERB application and walk through examples of community building and engagement techniques that center equity in resilience planning.

Overview of Water Resilience Products

This webinar will discuss the development and accuracy of next-generation intensity-duration-frequency curves for enhancing hydrologic design, and coupled models to support evaluation of risk from disruption of water infrastructure.

Lessons on State Resilience and Vulnerability to Complex Disasters

Over the past two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, many states have faced hurricanes, floods, extreme heat events, destructive wildfires, as well as other natural disasters and homeland security threats that test the resiliency of state agencies and the communities they serve. To learn more about state efforts, ASTHO and the Environmental Council of the States (ECOS), in coordination with the EPA’s Office of Research and Development, hosted two listening sessions in January 2022 on resilience and vulnerability to complex disasters or environmental events with multiple interacting impacts.

The sessions focused on how state environmental and health agencies can prevent and mitigate environmental pollution and related public health impacts from disaster events (e.g., natural disasters and extreme weather, wildfire events, environmental contamination, chemical spills), especially during COVID-19 response and recovery.

Listening Session 1 focused on best practices in planning for complex disasters. Listening Session 2 focused on best practices in implementing policies and practices during and after complex disasters. This summary document highlights lessons learned and offers a path forward for states and co-regulators.

Enhancing Climate Resilience in the Water Sector

This is a one-hour webinar to assist drinking water and wastewater utilities with “Enhancing Climate Resilience in the Water Sector.” Participants will learn about the Climate-Resilient Water Utilities (CRWU) initiative developed by EPA to increase resilience to extreme weather events. The webinar will also feature the Water Research Foundation’s (WRF) efforts to help utility managers understand and assess climate-related risks and opportunities and incorporate them into strategic planning.
This webinar will:
  • Share information about the EPA’s free risk and resilience resources for water utilities, including resources to plan for extreme weather and tools to assess risks of extreme weather;
  • Discuss how EPA’s tools can be applied to water utilities of all sizes; and
  • Hear from water sector experts implementing programs to enhance resilience to extreme weather events.