Plan B Engineering and Our 5 Big Challenges and Opportunities this Century

Looking into a future of climate change and the opportunities and challenges that engineers will face should be one of those things we reflect more on.  The key will be adaptation in the face of new realities.  I will start with the five below:

1. Summer Heat - The assumption is that keeping people cool in places like Houston will be given the most attention.  This will be a big challenge.  But also think in terms of opportunities in other places.  If it gets too hot, the Norther latitudes start to look very livable.  Canada could become the place to move.  Get out the atlas and start planning ahead.  Building new infrastructure in cooler geographies will provide growth opportunities.
2. Drought - Water and wastewater resource management is the ultimate in inefficient public policy and economics.  We basically give water away and have a political mandate to continue this practice.  No rain will force new efficiency reforms and better ways of thinking.  Engineering will have opportunities in Big Data, smart metering, and greater real time information management that allows for customer behavioral change.
3. Coastal Flooding - On your next vacation to the beach in Florida, take a look at coastal housing. What you see are families and businesses that want their "cake and eat it to."  They want their views, but they also want their risk spread across the whole country.  This could be the biggest climate change market - - helping people manage their "cake and eat it to" proposition in the face of increasing costs, risks, and uncertainty of coastal living.
4. Storm Intensity - Resiliency increasingly becomes key in the context of our real estate stock and infrastructure matrix.  Bad things are going to happen more often this century.  Engineers that can manage effectively in the world of "bad things are going to happen more often" will be in big demand.
5. Famine - The first four opportunities and challenges generate the famine concern.  This century will need a new revolution in agricultural innovation.  Population demands will demand increasing yields while climate change will put pressure in the opposite direction.  This complex problem will be a big test for engineering across the globe.