LA wildfires recap: The Reengineer Monitor #9

Lakeside heat pumps, electric ferry, a climate-ready city - and more!

The California National Guard responds to the devastating LA wildifres. Photo by California National Guard.

Just over a week ago, the first of what would become multiple wildfires broke out in Los Angeles. The infernos proved catastrophic and deadly. Thousands of people have lost their homes. I covered the various ways in which climate change may have exacerbated the fires, for BBC News.

And, below, I’ve gathered together some stories and commentary, to explain what the fires revealed about the vulnerabilities of built infrastructure during disasters like this.

SPECIAL: LA wildfires

Against the odds, some houses survived. While detailed investigations are yet to take place, it is possible that the construction of certain buildings made them more resilient. Kriston Capps at Bloomberg spoke to the architect behind one Passivhaus home that emerged relatively unscathed.

In contrast, the “flimsy” light, wooden frame construction of many other houses in LA (and around the US) was criticised in the wake of the fires by Stephen Jacob Smith, executive director of the Center for Building in North America.

Many modern products and items of furniture are full of plastics, notes The Atlantic’s Zoë Schlanger. This can accelerate fires and make them even more toxic.

LAist has a discussion of what the fires could mean for California’s struggling insurance market.

And the LA Times explores how environmental regulations could be relaxed in order to help homeowners rebuild destroyed properties as quickly as possible. However, Oliver Wainwright of The Guardian scrutinises this impulse, given that rebuilding quickly in fire-prone places may not prove very wise in the long run.

Smoke from the fires was visible from many miles away. Photo by Frank Kovalchek.

Emily Pontecorvo in Heatmap finds that there is already a law to help ensure vegetation is not allowed to grow close to buildings in California, since that increases their vulnerability to wildfires. But this law has never come into force.

Smoke generated by the wildfires was extreme. Many LA residents were left wondering how to keep themselves safe from the fumes. Besides masking up when outside, many turned to air purifiers. And for those who couldn’t source one immediately, NPR’s Bill Chappell explained how to make one with a box fan, air filters and duct tape.

One of the worst-affected neighbourhoods was Altadena, home to many employees of Nasa’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). Among the JPL staff who sadly lost their homes was Benjamin Hamlington. He put out a widely-shared post on LinkedIn, which, incredibly, contained a dash of hope:

“Even if thriving isn’t possible (which I really don’t think it is), protecting what is most important to us, supporting vulnerable communities across the globe, and ensuring a decent life for our kids can be possible and is worth working towards as best as we can. We can be both realistic and hopeful of finding a positive solution – one that doesn’t accomplish everything, maybe, but one that does enough.”