The 2024 RISE Riverine Neighborhood Resilience Problem accelerates innovation by connecting issues needing higher options to innovators with new resilience-building applied sciences, merchandise, and companies.
RISE is a U.S.-based nonprofit with a mission to speed up innovation and enterprise progress by figuring out, validating, and scaling options to neighborhood local weather resilience challenges comparable to flooding and sea degree rise. RISE achieves this by operating Neighborhood Resilience Problem competitions and providing funding and different assist from its Resilience Innovation Fund (RIF), Accelerator, Hub, and Testbed in Virginia.
Context for the Riverine Neighborhood Resilience Problem
As local weather change brings extra frequent and intense storms, riverine communities are more and more weak to distinctive flood threats that may change lives immediately.
On August 30, 2021, Hurley, Virginia, skilled extreme penalties when 7 inches of rainfall from the remnants of Hurricane led to a riverine flood that tragically took one life, destroyed 19 houses, and severely broken 24 extra. Lower than a 12 months later, on July 12, 2022, comparable circumstances struck Whitewood and Pilgrims Knob in Virginia. Although no lives have been misplaced on this latter occasion, the storm led to the destruction of 21 houses and harm to 25 others.
FEMA didn’t present particular person home-owner help in each cases, and only some affected residents obtained insurance coverage payouts.
The hazards of such occasions are multifaceted, together with heavy rain, robust winds, excessive and swift waters, and mudslides. These pure forces could cause important harm to buildings, probably resulting in destruction, accidents, or fatalities. Additional, they typically lead to giant portions of particles, the gathering and elimination of that are expensive and time-consuming, including to the challenges confronted by impacted communities.
Why Be a part of the Riverine Neighborhood Resilience Problem?
A complete of as much as USD 1 million in funding is offered to assist options in response to this Problem. Candidates can apply for as much as USD 300,000 in non-equity funding. Groups of companies can submit built-in options and will obtain as much as USD 750,000.
Since 2018, RISE has deployed greater than USD 7 million in non-equity funding and companies from the Resilience Innovation Fund to 35 companies growing scalable options that create substantial new worth, might be demonstrated in Virginia, and be constructed into sustainable ventures. The RIF is seeded with funds from the U.S. Division of Housing and City Growth and the Commonwealth of Virginia.
RISE additionally accelerates the expansion of companies growing progressive options to local weather resilience challenges. The Resilience Innovation Accelerator works with winners of the RISE Neighborhood Resilience Challenges to assist companies maximize the affect and turn into sustainable after the RISE funding. The Accelerator affords a two-month program primarily based on the Nationwide Science Basis’s I-Corps methods tailor-made to the resilience sector.
Additional, RISE brokers corporations’ entry to Virginia’s sources by way of its Resilience Innovation Hub & Testbed for validating or in any other case demonstrating resilience-building improvements. RISE facilitates entry to real-world pilot websites and permits, a co-working workplace and workshop area in Norfolk, Virginia, information and key stakeholders, a neighborhood of resilience entrepreneurs, PR alternatives, and regulatory technical help.
Along with the above advantages, corporations additionally profit from:
- Regulatory and allowing help
- Entry to real-world datasets
- Entry to a longtime resilience neighborhood
- PR assist and media visibility
- Strategic collaborations with consultants and stakeholders
Flood Occasion Early Warning
The Problem: Riverine flooding occasions are getting extra extreme and frequent. There’s a want for correct and well timed warnings to guard communities.
Potential Options: Identification of flooding-affected areas from 12 hours earlier than pluvial-induced flooding occasions, constantly up to date by way of the passage of the rainfall exercise. Era of flood occasion warnings and the event of a warning-generation protocol. Inclusion of communication infrastructure to make sure that messages/information get transferred to required personnel. Protocols for actions to messages for all constituents (e.g., emergency managers, rescue squads, first responders, and so forth.).
Panorama and Constructing Adaptation
The Problem: Publish-flood, occasions continuously lead to important panorama adjustments, impacting the suitability of sure areas for rebuilding. Recognizing this, there’s a rising consensus that some land parcels are now not match for conventional building. Figuring out essentially the most useful post-flood use for these areas presents a problem. These areas may function testing grounds for progressive constructing strategies designed to face up to flooding.
Potential Options: RISE is in search of options that:
- Think about constructing/panorama mitigations with both new or current adaptation methods. Extra mitigations could also be thought-about if the applicant gives complete particulars of the expertise and its advantages. Each rural and extra city environments could also be thought-about.
- Establish essentially the most acceptable and cost-effective constructing/panorama variations on a parcel-by-parcel foundation together with a technique or entry to a technique, for performing a benefit-cost evaluation for each constructing and parcel.
- Present mitigation that may be carried out on properties pre- and post-disaster.
- Provide a benefit-cost evaluation (BCA) on a parcel-by-parcel foundation utilizing essentially the most present topography and flood occasion datasets.
- Could also be carried out utilizing native labor and contractors, to assist the native enterprise neighborhood and workforce.
- Present evaluation and estimate of the decreased price of insurance coverage enabled by the mitigations.
Verify the web site for extra particulars within the Applicant Information.
Neighborhood Insurance coverage Program
The Problem: Many householders and renters in rural areas lack flood insurance coverage. In consequence, monetary help (and different assist) for these communities after flood occasions usually comes from state flood reduction funds, which are sometimes allotted by way of particular funds requests, or from charitable donations. Nonetheless, these funds are primarily directed towards householders, typically leaving renters with out assist.
As well as, the median earnings of the area is low (one of many causes that many locally don’t take part in flood insurance coverage applications). This matter intends to construct a sustainable insurance coverage program that helps these residents and others.
Potential Options: Options are being hunted for the design of an insurance coverage program that:
- Supplies assist to households and companies after occasions by shifting threat by way of insurance coverage and different monetary methods, making certain safety towards main losses.
- Deal with residents’ and companies’ wants at (roughly) outlined occasions:
- Wants might vary from meals, shelter, and short-term funds to constructing substitute prices. A part of the Problem will likely be to doc these wants.
- Pays out after clearly describable and measurable flooding occasion degree if a parametric program is proposed. Approaches aside from parametric applications will even be thought-about.
- Supplies payout funds rapidly and in a method that’s accessible by all constituents – at the side of findings from the Residents’ Neighborhood Insurance coverage matter space.
- Considers riverine flooding as the one peril.
- Is sustainable all through the area of Southwest Virginia — as outlined by the LENOWISCO PDC, Cumberland Plateau PDC, Mount Rogers PDC, and the New River Regional Fee.
- Is supported by a resident restoration program to supply steerage pre- and post-event help and steerage. Gives pre- and post-event help and steerage by way of a resident restoration program. The objective of this Problem is to design an insurance coverage program that may work with and help in such assist applications.
Who Can Apply?
This problem is open to all international small companies and nonprofit organizations engaged on flood adaptation, mitigation, and administration options. Candidates might also associate with bigger corporations or analysis establishments, nonetheless, the mission lead should be from small companies/nonprofits. As well as:
- You must be a enterprise entity.
- Your small business has to have the ability to deploy your answer in Southwest Virginia, both by your self or by hiring an area associate.
- Your answer needs to be on the prototype stage or later.
- If you’re chosen as a finalist, you may be required to submit extra documentation, together with technical particulars of your answer and a piece plan.
- Finalists will likely be required to register with the Virginia State Company Fee (SCC).
Timeline of the RISE Riverine Neighborhood Resilience Problem
Purposes at the moment are open!
- April 4th, eleventh, 18th, twenty fifth — 1 pm EST: Weekly informational webinars.
- Could sixth, 2024 — 2 pm EST.: Software Submission Deadline
- Could tenth, 2024: Alert Finalists
- Could twentieth, 2024: Deadline to Submit Extra Documentation
- June: Winners Introduced
RISE is trying to fund progressive approaches that may be constructed into viable and sustainable companies. This implies companies that generate revenues by way of gross sales of their merchandise and/or entice additional funding to develop or develop income sources.
Discover all the main points about this distinctive problem & ship in your software at present.
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