Climate Change, Strata & Adaptation Strategies
Climate change issues are becoming more [and more] impactful in strata title, so here's some focused research...
A Quick Read
Strategies for strata buildings to deal with climate changes have been around since this 2013 NCCARF research on the impacts on strata building and stakeholders and strategies. It’s now looking like it’s finally time to implement them. worked on as the impacts of weather changes and changing social, economic and political imperatives are more obvious and common . So, what did the research discover and recommend?
[a 7:25 minute read, with 1425 words]
The Full Article
INTRODUCTION
The research was conducted by Griffith University’s Department of Tourism, Sport, and Hotel Management and the executive summary follows.
Executive Summary
The broad aim of this report is to inform policy making concerned with preparing strata and community title (S&CT) buildings to deal with challenges that are expected to result from climate change. The report develops and analyses 24 recommendations designed to advance the capacity of S&CT buildings to better cope with anticipated damage and disruption of services caused by an increasing incidence of severe weather events resulting from global warming.
The study was very extensive and covered more than just the science of climate change, by additionally considering:
the typical physical impacts on strata buildings,
regulations and controls affecting adaptation by strata buildings,
operational and people issues inside and outside strata buildings affecting decisions and change,
insurance and its relationship with major weather events, and
recommendations for law and other changes.
THE RESEARCH REPORT
Over 146 pages, the authors [which included me] consider the likely climate change impacts and the structural, practical and political issues facing strata title buildings and stakeholders in dealing with and adapting for those changes.
You can read the Paper, Adapting strata and community title buildings for climate change here.
THE RECOMMENDATIONS
So as to ensure this was not just an academic and theoretical navel gazing exercise, we also produce a seperate Stakeholder Action list and recommendations for Government as listed below.
You can the Stakeholder actions list manual here.
24 STRATA CLIMATE CHANGE RESEARCH RECOMMENDATIONS [RANKED FOR IMPORTANCE BY SURVEY RESPONDENTS]
1. New strata and community title building construction should meet heightened standards with respect to climatic event resilience. For example, to lessen potential flood damage, significant lift, utilities, and other infrastructure should be located above basement levels.
2. Developers should be provided with information and kits about climate change and its impacts on and adaptation strategies for strata and community title buildings and be required to provide this information to buyers of units in new S&CT buildings.
3. Insurers should be required to make their insurance appraisal of strata and community title buildings weather event risk exposure publicly available in a manner that the information can be easily accessed by owners and potential purchasers of lots in the building.
4. All strata and community title buildings above a certain size should be legally required to develop and communicate an emergency evacuation and management plan to be implemented immediately prior to, during, and in the aftermath of a significant emergency weather event.
5. Introduce a requirement that in strata and community title buildings above a certain size, the resident manager must complete a disaster management response training course to improve their capacity and powers to co-ordinate the activities of strata and community title buildings (evacuation, etc) in the event of an emergency weather event.
6. Provide information and training modules for strata managers about climate change and its impacts on, and adaptation strategies for strata and community title buildings.
7. Establish an emergency status designation for strata and community title buildings that signifies a change in governance arrangements to deal with the changed circumstances confronted by owners, committees, and managers during an emergency weather situation.
8. Similar to the energy rating system that has been developed for buildings generally, to develop a strata and community title buildings ‘weather event resilience’ rating system that provides an overall score based on sub-scores relating to different weather event risk exposures (eg, ‘flood resilience sub-score’, ‘fire resilience sub score', 'cyclone resilience sub-score', etc).
9. Include projected expenditure on climate change building adaptation measures as a clearly defined part of forecast capital works by strata and community title buildings in sinking fund planning and forecasting.
10. Provide information and training modules for resident managers about climate change and its impacts on and adaptation strategies for strata and community title buildings.
11. Acknowledge the reality that some strata and community title buildings may become uninsurable or be unable to obtain affordable complete insurance cover by creating a ‘lower insurance cover’ or ‘uninsurable’ strata and community title buildings category, subject to appropriate decisions and disclosures.
12. Strata managers should be encouraged to become champions of climate change awareness and adaptation for strata and community title buildings.
13. Establish and maintain a website and related social media outlets that provide a persuasive and authoritative rationale concerning the need for strata and community title buildings to invest in greater building climate change resilience.
14. To make it easier for strata and community title buildings to make decisions to invest in climate change-related property upgrades, reduce the threshold vote required for such decisions from the current unanimous or special resolution (three-quarter majority) to a simple majority decision.
15. Create climate change adaptation awareness champions within and outside strata and community titlebuildings.
16. Lenders to develop an appraisal procedure to rate strata and community title buildings’ exposure and resilience to climate change weather events and apply the rating as part of lending criteria utilised when extending mortgage loans to unit purchasers. strata and community title.
17. Professional and other non-government bodies such as Strata Community Australia and Green Strata to develop a list of experienced consultants and/or recommended experts who can be engaged to advise strata and community title buildings that wish to undertake climate change building adaptation planning and work.
18. Government (national, state and/or local) and private sector organisations with vested interests (such as insurers and lenders) to subsidise climate change adaptation works on one or more typical strata and community title buildings in order to provide a model of the type of climate change adaptation works that can be undertaken and to showcase the benefits.
19. Resident manager and strata manager contracts with strata and community title buildings to include provisions covering the type and extent of their responsibilities and authorities in the event of a weather emergency incident.
20. Insurers should base insurance risk assessment on strata and community title buildings’ specific characteristics, not just their geographical location. Basing insurance premiums on strata and community title buildings’ specific characteristics, which incorporate climate change resilience, will provide owners with an incentive to invest in adaptation to improve a building’s climate change resilience.
21. Insurance companies to provide strata and community title buildings with a policy option to insure for infrastructure upgrades, in the event of a claim, not simply for replacement costs. Such upgrades could be conducted in a manner consistent with engineering greater building climate change resilience. Insurance Bodies Owners
22. Government and industry-based training courses directed to strata and community title building owners, committee members, strata managers, resident managers, and other stakeholders to include a ‘prepare your strata and community title building for climate change’ component. Federal & State Gov’t, & Strata Title Industry Bodies Owners, Strata Managers & Resident Managers
23. A pro forma disaster management plan or plans for strata and community title buildings should be developed by government and/or non-government bodies and made available on a government and privately maintained ‘prepare your strata and community titlebuilding for climate change’ website. Federal & State Gov’t, & Strata Title Industry Bodies Owners, Strata & Resident Managers
24. As part of the strata and community title building development and construction approval process, require that an evacuation plan and general disaster management plan be included in strata and community title buildings’ original documentation prepared by developers.
CONCLUSIONS
Although the research and recommendations are more than 10 years old, it looks like the world [including strata stakeholders] have finally caught up with the realities of and need to deal with the impacts on climate change on strata buildings on things like building repairs and maintenance, adaptation for more extreme weather [hot, cold, wet and dry], insurance cover issues, etc.
So, is it time to start focusing on these things?
February 01, 2024
Francesco …
Although the research and recommendations are more than 10 years old, strata stakeholders have not caught up with the realities of climate change. The following is an example of an issue that will become increasingly common, especially in apartment buildings from the 1960s.
Our 24-apartment building was constructed in the 60s. Gas was used for stoves, space heating, and hot water—keeping pressure off an electrical system, which was never designed to carry the full load of all-electric living.
Now, with the removal of gas, these apartments must convert to fully electric appliances. This includes electric stoves, electric heating, and electric hot water—a significant jump in demand.
So what happens?
• In one apartment, too many appliances running at once can trip the circuit. It’s annoying, but easy enough to reset.
• Across the building, if multiple apartments (especially on the same electrical phase) are drawing heavy loads at the same time, the main switchboard can overload. This can cause a blackout—or worse, damage the electrical infrastructure.
And yet, the Owners Corporation’s position is a deeply flawed and short-sighted one:
“It’s the individual owner's problem. The benefit principle would apply. The gas pipe only serves one lot.”
The real issue here is the capacity and safety of shared infrastructure.
When the main switchboard fails, it doesn’t just affect one resident—it affects everyone. And repairing major building systems isn’t a private cost—it’s a strata cost.
This is exactly what climate adaptation means in practice: anticipating these systemic impacts and addressing them collectively, not reactively. Whether it’s upgrading switchboards, managing overheating risks, or future-proofing plumbing and stormwater systems—strata buildings need to be planning for it now.