Build Better Jamaica spokesperson Dr. Kwame Emmanuel presents an overview of Build Better Jamaica project, "Developing Design Concepts for Climate Change Resilient Buildings" at the Caribbean School of Architecture, University of Technology, Kingston, Jamaica.

1. Build Better Jamaica:
A Technical
Assessment
Kwame Emmanuel, PhD
Technical Consultant
Institute for Sustainable
Development
UWI

3. Climate Change
Hazard Impact Infrastructure Implications
Sea level rise Coastal flooding and
erosion, land lost, seawater
intrusion
Damage to coastal infrastructure
and pollution of underground
water resources
Category 4 and 5 hurricanes Storm surge, inland
flooding, wind related
damage
Damage to infrastructure
including electricity and water
Torrential rainfall events Inland flooding Damage to infrastructure
including electricity and water
Prolonged drought Limited water resources Water supply restrictions
Increased temperatures Heat stress
Coral bleaching
Increased emergence of
vector borne diseases
Increased energy and water use.
Damage to coastal infrastructure
by coastal erosion.
Vector habitats

4. Climate Change Resilience
• “Simply, it is the ability to survive, recover from, and even thrive in
changing climatic conditions…even unpredictable conditions” (The Asian
Cities Climate Change Resilience Network)
• IPCC definition: social and ecological resilience.
• Capacity of the natural environment to provide regulatory services
effectively.
• Wetlands: flood control, storm and surge protection, groundwater
replenishment, shoreline stabilization, carbon sequestration, and limits the
impacts of sea level rise and droughts.
• Degradation = vulnerability
• Protection = resilience

5. Physical Planning
• “Planning is like preventative
medicine, whereas we have spent the
last generation focusing on curative
medicine. So, we have had social
upheaval, the diseconomies of
retrofitting infrastructure, and the
avoidable costs of rehabilitating
settlements after natural disasters,
when instead we should have been
planning for new sustainable urban
settlement and hazard mitigation”
(Platt 2007, 6) .

6. Policies
Physical Planning
• The National Physical Plan 1978-1998
which includes the National Settlement
strategy
• Development Plans and Orders
• Development and Investment Manual
• Vision 2030
• National Land Policy of Jamaica
• National Housing Policy and
Implementation Plan (Draft) 2009
Climate Related
• Caribbean Risk Management Guidelines
for Climate Change Adaptation Decision
Making (2003)
• Climate Change and the Caribbean: A
Regional Framework for Achieving
Development Resilient to Climate
Change (2009-2015)
• Draft Implementation Plan for A
Regional Framework for Achieving
Development Resilient to Climate
Change (2011)
• The Caribbean Catastrophe Risk
Insurance Facility (CCRIF)
• Vision 2030
• Medium Term Socio-Economic Policy
Framework 2009-2012
• Draft National Climate Change Policy
and Action Plan (2012)
• Draft National Hazard-Risk Reduction
Policy for Jamaica (2005)

7. Policies (Cont’d)
Ecological Resilience:
• National Forest Policy and Plan
• National Policy on Ocean and
Coastal Zone Management and
Action Plan
• Policy for Jamaica’s System of
Protected Areas
• Towards A Watershed Policy for
Jamaica
These policies seek to maintain the
regulatory/ecological services of
the natural environment.

8. Development and Investment Manual: Hazard Mitigation

9. Assessment
Threats
• Development control encourages
illegal developments by enforcing a
cumbersome and time-consuming
process for formal developments.
• Housing policy and vulnerable areas
• Economic policy and vulnerable areas:
Mega-hotel construction, N-S Highway
• Budgetary constraints and policy
support
Issues
• Disconnect between political agendas
and climate change time-lines
• Deficiency in the capacity at the local
level to incorporate scientific data into
decision making
• UDC and Ministry of Housing autonomy
• Lack of identification, quantification and
coordination of future land use
requirements and enforcement of
planning regulations.
• Inadequate datasets and data sharing
• Impact uncertainty
• Development Orders
• Outdated climate risk consideration
• Limited human capacity assess
increasing numbers of more complex
development applications as well as for
monitoring and enforcement

10. Recommendations
Resilience Planning Principles:
• Sustainability
• Environmental conservation
• Systems approach
• Combination of top down and bottom
up approaches
• Integration through technology use
• Decentralization
• Dynamic and flexible
• Support mixed land use (residential,
commercial and recreational) with
appropriate infrastructure.
• Enforce the construction of high
quality design buildings, sustainable
use of natural resources and the
transition to low carbon development
in a changing climate.
• Evidence based
Strategies:
• Political sensitization
• Public sensitization
• Funding and incentives
• Mainstreaming resilience into all sectors
• Integrated planning
• Sustainable community planning (SMART
Code)
• Building guidelines revision
• Rating system development
• Squatter management
• Research and data sharing
• Course development and training
• Pilot projects
• Enforcement
• Institutional rationalization
• Capacity building

11. Integrated Planning
• National Spatial Plan (NSP): an integrated planning tool with overall vision, goals,
guidelines, development priorities, future land use requirements
• Dynamic, flexible and web-based Geographical Information System (GIS), which
links spatial data with attribute data relevant to planning.
• Overlaying of spatial datasets, which are managed by various entities with the
responsibility for environmental protection, infrastructural development etc
• Land use zones:
1.“areas zoned for development”
2.“no build zones” (for example, extremely vulnerable areas and
environmentally sensitive sites)
3.“areas zoned for development with conditions” (for example, moderately
vulnerable areas)
• Parish or local development plans can then be developed and included in the NSP.

13. Rating System
Examples:
– The Pearl Rating System for Estidama (Sustainability)
– Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED)
– BREEAM
– Code for Sustainable Homes
• Mandatory minimum rating linked to level of vulnerability
in different locations / zones
• Tax incentive to encourage maximum rating
• Building conditions attached to mortgage agreements

14. The Pearl Rating System

15. Institutional and Procedural Framework
Referral
agencies,
including
OPDEM
National Spatial Plan
University
Consortium
Private sector
planners
Insurance Ministry of
Finance
NEPA
UDC
Ministry of Housing
PIOJ
JIA, JIE
Local Government
Local/Parish
Development Plans
DEVELOPER
Bank

16. “the next iceberg that we hit…is
going to be climate change. We
can see that iceberg ahead of us
right now, but we can’t turn”
(James Cameron, Director of the
Titanic).