As we all know, 90 percent of the damage in New Orleans after Category 3 Hurricane Katrina missed the city was caused by a manmade failure of the national levee system.
So please, let stop using what is known as "Katrina shorthand." It was not a natural disaster. It was a manmade disaster, or in the words of John Goodman's character in the HBO series Treme: "A federal f----up of epic proportions."
The same can be said about Haiti, as explained in the video below from the TED conference. The destruction from the earthquake was an engineering disaster.
In both cases, unless we rebuild differently, we are setting ourselves up for the next disaster. In my case, I'm here in New Orleans as one of the most vocal proponents for proper window installation, proper restoration of old wood windows, effective water-resistive exterior cladding, and the right kind of insulation for this hot and humid climate.
Assuming the Army Corps of Engineers gets the levees right this time (as so many other advanced countries have managed to do), and the city never floods again, what a shame it would be if the rebuilt houses failed from mold, rot and pests.
With climate change, our world will see more and more disasters, natural or otherwise. As they happen (and obviously an earthquake is not caused by climate change), let's rebuild right so the affected houses will last decades if not centuries to come.
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