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INSTRUCTOR: 
Ming Liu

Purpose and Background

To better deal with coastal extreme events due to climate change, a workshop on Resilience of Navy Waterfront Facilities in a Changing Climate was held at the U.S. Naval Academy in September, 2023 (Part I) and at ASCE Headquarter in April, 2024 (Part II), co-sponsored by Naval Facilities Engineering and Expeditionary Warfare Center (NAVFAC - EXWC) and ASCE/COPRI. Part I of the workshop focused on developing non-stationary extreme wind speeds, sea level rise, and flooding load on waterfront facilities, while Part II of the workshop exclusively involved life-cycle assessment, performance-based resilience planning and climate adaption to help protect public safety and to enrich the quality of life in coastal regions.

The proposed panel discussion is intended to present the lessons learned from the workshop, based on the group discussions of over one hundred coastal resilience leaders and professionals from government agencies, industry, and academia. A 4-panelist discussion will focus on implementation of the innovative methodologies and techniques identified in the workshop through the four 15-minute presentations on (i) predicting future climate scenarios, (ii) updating extreme design loads, (iii) promoting performance-based design and site-specific resilience planning for coastal operation continuity, and (iv) risk-based multi-criteria decision-making with considerations of safety, social-economics , and life-cycle performance, followed by a 30-minutes Q/A session. The outcomes of this panel discussion will stimulate the on-going efforts on coastal resilience planning and climate adaptation sponsored by the U.S. Navy, NIST, NOAA, ASCE, among other R&D organizations in climate change communities.

As global temperatures continue to rise there is increasing evidence that coastal storms are also becoming more frequent and more intense. These phenomena coupled with the effects of Sea Level Rise (SLR) as polar ice caps melt present increasing challenges for coastal communities worldwide and requires urgent action to combat climate change to ensure these communities are sustainable and resilient. Resilience-based decision-making support is integral to this process to ensure community stakeholders have quantifiable information to inform their actions which may include mitigations and/or adaptation strategies. Such quantification requires community-level models of physical infrastructure such as buildings, roadways, and water and power networks to be fully coupled with household, social institution (e.g. hospitals and schools), and economic models. This session will highlight the use of community resilience modeling to assess hurricane hazards and resulting resilience decision-support with a focus on two major testbeds: Mobile, AL and Galveston, TX. The impact of coastal multi-hazards is assessed for metrics ranging from infrastructure damage and service loss (e.g., disruption of goods flow through port and intermodal transportation) to economic and social impacts ranging from changes in household income, local domestic supply by sector, to population dislocation. The potential to leverage robust community modeling, often referred to as digital twins, to assess the coupling between short- and long-term climate impacts, such as hurricanes and sea level rise, or to evaluate mitigation strategies is also highlighted.

Three 10 minute presentations will be followed by a moderated panel discussion including Q&A with the audience. The virtual audience will be listening only.

Learning Outcomes and Session Benefits

Upon completion of this course, you will be able to:

• Explain the methodologies and techniques identified for addressing non-stationary extreme wind speeds, sea level rise, and flooding loads on coastal facilities.
• Describe performance-based resilience planning and climate adaptation strategies that promote safety and operational continuity in coastal regions.
• Discuss the role of risk-based, multi-criteria decision-making in resilience planning, incorporating safety, socioeconomics, and life-cycle performance.
• Identify how community resilience modeling and digital twin technology can be used to assess and mitigate the impacts of coastal multi-hazards, including infrastructure damage and social-economic disruptions.

Assessment of Learning Outcomes

Learning outcomes are assessed and achieved through passing a 10 multiple choice question post-test with at least a 70%.

Who Should Attend?

• Construction engineers
• Port Engineers
• Sustainability Engineers
• Project Managers
• Consulting engineers
• Public Agency Engineers

How to Earn Your PDHs and Receive Your Certificate of Completion

This course is worth 1 PDH. To receive your certificate of completion, you will need to attend the live session and/or watch the recording(s) and complete the post-session survey. If the course is taken On-Demand, there will also be a 10 multiple choice question post-test.

View Important Policies and System Requirements for this course