How Smart Investments and AI Are Reinventing Infrastructure Resilience in a Climate-Challenged World

 In Europe and North America, the construction industry is facing unprecedented challenges as climate change leads to increasingly frequent extreme weather events. Lifeline infrastructure systems—such as water, electricity, transportation, and communication—are essential to maintaining the fabric of society, but their importance often goes unnoticed until disaster strikes. The reality is that much of this infrastructure was built in the mid-20th century, based on outdated standards that fail to meet the demands of today’s environment and technology.

Disasters like Hurricane Helene in the U.S. and the 2013 floods in Germany have revealed just how vulnerable aging infrastructure has become. In Bat Cave, North Carolina, for instance, the 2024 hurricane left bridges and roads destroyed, forcing residents to cross rivers on makeshift structures. Many parts of Europe face similar vulnerabilities. In Germany, key transportation and power systems were paralyzed for weeks after severe flooding. Even though reconstruction efforts followed, many systems were merely restored to their original form—without upgrading their resilience to new climate realities.

At the 2025 Building Innovation Conference, hosted by the U.S. National Institute of Building Sciences, North Carolina Transportation Secretary Joey Hopkins emphasized that much of the nation’s infrastructure was designed in the 1960s—when cars were smaller and slower, and highway ramps were placed on the left with very short acceleration lanes. These outdated designs are now liabilities, especially in a high-speed, high-density era.

Moreover, disaster recovery funding in the U.S. typically only allows for restoration to pre-disaster conditions. This leaves critical systems vulnerable to the same failures, creating a recurring cycle of damage and repair. Madhu Beriwal, founder of IEM International, warned that 20th-century infrastructure is being tasked with handling 21st-century climate events—an unsustainable and shortsighted approach.

What’s needed, experts argue, is a shift in thinking—from rebuilding to resilience. This includes the concept of functional recovery, which focuses not just on whether a building or system remains physically intact after a disaster, but whether it can quickly resume essential operations. Ronald Eguchi, CEO of ImageCat, a risk management firm based in California, said this shift in performance metrics could transform the way we plan for community resilience.

To that end, the Lifeline Infrastructure Hub—launched in 2024 by the National Institute of Building Sciences—aims to identify weak points in critical systems and develop cost-effective strategies to strengthen them. By fostering collaboration between government agencies, nonprofits, and industry, the Hub promotes smarter disaster recovery planning and helps communities bounce back faster.

A prime example of targeted resilience planning comes from New Orleans. Steven Nelson, General Superintendent of the city’s Sewerage and Water Board, shared that it wasn’t always the oldest parts of the city that failed most frequently during past disasters. By analyzing infrastructure performance data, the city has been able to prioritize upgrades more strategically.

Still, one of the biggest barriers to building resilient infrastructure is funding. Despite the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, inflation and declining gas tax revenues have strained state and local budgets. Hopkins noted that in North Carolina, some communities have even requested toll roads just to get critical projects funded—a sign of growing desperation to modernize outdated systems.

Public-private partnerships (PPPs) are emerging as one way to close this funding gap. Across the U.S., more states are exploring these collaborations to build smarter, more sustainable infrastructure. Meanwhile, in Europe, long-standing PPP models have helped fund advanced flood control systems and high-speed rail, offering a useful template.

Technology is also playing a central role. Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning are being used by local governments and utilities to maximize the impact of limited resources. In New Orleans, AI helps monitor and predict where water mains are likely to fail, allowing for preventive maintenance that reduces outages and saves money. Similar applications are helping cities optimize traffic management, identify risk hotspots, and prepare emergency responses.

In the Netherlands, “smart dikes” equipped with sensors track humidity, pressure, and movement, feeding real-time data into AI systems that predict potential flooding. In 2022, this technology helped prevent widespread water damage in Amsterdam’s suburbs by triggering early drainage protocols during a heavy storm.

The takeaway for both Europe and North America is clear: the construction industry must move beyond a “repair and repeat” mindset. Future infrastructure must be designed not only to withstand modern challenges, but to adapt and recover swiftly. This demands better materials, smarter designs, stronger coordination among stakeholders, and, critically, a willingness to invest with long-term resilience in mind.

Every infrastructure decision we make today is a wager on the future sustainability of our cities. With the right mix of data, technology, targeted funding, and collaborative planning, we can build infrastructure systems that don’t just survive the next disaster—but thrive beyond it.