How to Integrate the AIA's 8 Climate-Adaptive Design Principles in Your Projects
With Earth Day approaching, you might be reflecting on the vital role of design and construction professionals like you in creating a more sustainable future. It’s become clear that resilient, climate-adaptive design principles must take precedence in your projects, but what exactly does that mean, and how can you effectively implement these principles?
Let’s begin by defining some key terms. According to the Global Center on Adaptation, climate adaptation and resilience mean taking action to prepare for and adjust to the current and projected impacts of climate change. For the built world, this entails designing infrastructure to be more resilient to climate hazards, such as sea level fluctuations and extreme heat.
In this blog, we’ll explore the 8 design principles outlined by the American Institute of Architects (AIA) to help you adapt to changing conditions and create stronger, more resilient buildings. Plus, we’ll cover what to keep in mind for each design principle when you embark on a new project.
AIA’s Climate-Adaptive Design Principles
1. Place Based: Understand and communicate the project’s local hazard and climate risks as well as social, environmental, and economic challenges and opportunities.
Before diving into any design decisions, it’s crucial to understand the specific climate risks that the area faces. Whether it’s rising sea levels, extreme temperatures, flooding, or increasing storm frequency, each region has its own set of challenges. A thorough climate risk assessment should be the first step in any project and should guide the decisions that follow.
Place Based Design in Action: If you're working in a coastal region prone to flooding, elevating structures or using flood-resistant materials might be a priority. In areas with minimal rainfall, focusing on water conservation with rainwater harvesting systems may take precedence. By understanding the local climate, you can design buildings that are equipped to handle place-based challenges.
2. Risk Prepared: Incorporate a project’s hazard and climate risk when developing a strategy to avoid, mitigate, or reduce damage over the building’s service life. Explore the potential for maladaptation that may unintentionally increase vulnerability.
This design principle outlines the importance of evaluating potential threats, such as flooding, wildfires, or extreme temperatures, and developing strategies to either avoid, mitigate, or minimize the damage these risks could cause over the building’s lifespan. It also involves being mindful of maladaptation—unintended design choices or actions that could worsen vulnerability or create new risks in the future.
Risk Prepared Design in Action: For construction projects located in storm-prone areas, you might incorporate stormwater management systems, like rain gardens or permeable paving, to control runoff and reduce the risk of flooding. You might also consider future climate scenarios, such as sea level rise, ensuring the building remains resilient over its entire service life.
Permeable Pavers on CADdetails
3. Equitable: Consider all populations to be serviced by the project. Remove barriers to access and service while promoting inclusive social, environmental, and economic benefits for the community.
Equitable design means ensuring that all populations, especially those most vulnerable to climate impacts, have access to green spaces, affordable housing, and clean energy. It also involves promoting environmental justice by addressing climate risks such as heatwaves, flooding, or poor air quality in underserved areas, while ensuring that the social, environmental, and economic benefits of the project are distributed fairly across the entire community. The goal is to create a more inclusive, resilient, and sustainable environment for everyone.
Equitable Design in Action: In areas that are more vulnerable to heat waves, public parks might be designed with shaded areas, water features, and cooling stations to ensure that all residents have access to safe and cool spaces during extreme heat events. For communities facing cold temperatures, you could design community centers or other public buildings with Trombe walls, a passive solar heating technique that captures and stores the sun’s energy for natural warmth.
4. Precautionary: Select durable, low-maintenance building systems and materials that reduce negative consequences, such as the release of toxins or wind/waterborne debris if the building or site is damaged.
This design principle focuses on selecting materials that are resistant to extreme weather conditions, such as high winds or flooding, and that do not release harmful toxins or pollutants if the building is compromised. By prioritizing longevity and safety, this approach reduces the potential negative impacts on both the environment and the occupants, ensuring the building remains resilient and sustainable even in the face of climate-related stresses.
Precautionary Design in Action: You might consider using hurricane-resistant materials, such as impact-resistant windows and reinforced concrete, in areas prone to strong winds to prevent structural damage and reduce debris hazards. You might also use naturally sourced, non-toxic building materials to reduce the risk of harmful chemical exposure in the event of a building's damage.
5. System Centric: Recognize that buildings are part of a community system with inherent interdependencies, opportunities, and potential for unintended consequences. Explore the impacts of the project at the building and community scale and harmonize solutions.
System-centric design emphasizes viewing a building or project not as a standalone entity, but as part of a larger, interconnected system—whether that’s a neighborhood, city, ecosystem, or infrastructure network. It encourages you to think about the broader impacts of your decisions and to build in a way that benefits both the building and the wider community or environment.
System Centric Design in Action: Incorporate microgrids and shared renewable energy systems in your urban designs. Not only does this lower energy costs and emissions for the building you create, but it also provides energy resilience during outages for the entire community.
6. Ready: Plan for disruptions. Support the operation and occupants of the building, including its role in the community during an emergency, outage, or other disruption. Consider emergency preparations, safe shelter, physical protection, and mental well-being.
This design principle is all about designing buildings and spaces that can adapt to disruption, whether it’s a natural disaster, power outage, public health crisis, or other unexpected event. To design with readiness in mind, ask yourself: how will this building continue to support its occupants—and maybe even its broader community—when things go wrong?
Ready Design in Action: Use passive ventilation, natural daylighting with large windows, and thermal mass to maintain safe indoor temperatures even during HVAC or power outages—supporting occupant health and comfort during disruptions.
Windows on CADdetails
7. Service-Life Focused: Ensure design choices support building performance throughout the project’s intended lifecycle; balancing first costs and long-term value.
Focusing on service life means thinking long-term. Instead of just designing for immediate functionality or the lowest upfront cost, this approach focuses on how a building will perform over its entire life span and how you can make smart design choices today that will pay off for years to come.
Service-Life Focused Design in Action: Choose durable, low-maintenance materials fiber cement siding, metal roofing, and porcelain tile for your projects. These may cost more upfront, but they last longer, require less upkeep, and reduce long-term costs.
8. Adaptive: Design the project to accommodate and adapt to changing social, economic, and environmental conditions throughout its anticipated service life.
Adaptive design is forward-thinking, people-centered, and built for change. It’s about creating spaces that can evolve and respond to changing social, economic, and environmental conditions throughout a building’s lifetime. Rather than locking into fixed uses or rigid systems, adaptive design focuses on versatility and responsiveness from day one.
Adaptive Design in Action: Incorporate modular interior walls and flexible MEP (Mechanical, Electrical, and Plumbing) systems that allow your space to adapt to changing conditions. Design the core and shell of your building for long-term versatility, so the building can be repurposed even if the original tenant or use changes.
Modular pergola on CADdetails
Final Thoughts
As design and construction professionals, it’s your responsibility to ensure the buildings you create not only survive but thrive in a changing climate. From understanding local risks and selecting resilient materials for your projects, you have the power to help protect the communities you serve. Use Earth Day as your reminder to prioritize these 8 climate-adaptive design principles as you build the world around you.
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Author: CADdetails
Cover image by Geoffrey Moffett on Unsplash
