Climate change & condos

4 years ago

At our 12-unit condo building we're beginning to look into how new climate patterns are going to affect our building.

For example, increased flooding may be one such case.

We're at the bottom of a hill and have 4 basements. The basement that is at highest point of the slope often gets flooded the most when we have a heavy snow or rain storm.

We do have a sump pump and a French Drain built along the edge of the basement floor. It's at the bottom of the inside wall that faces the hill.

But we may need to look at other ways we can prepare against a flood.

Another challenge is posed by the new move away from fossil fuels.

Some unit owners have converted from gas powered heaters to electrical ones. One person has an electric heating and cooling system. The challenge will come if suddenly more unit owners decide to get electrical systems.

Currently, our building only has a 200 amp electric service.

We've been considering bringing this up to either a 400 or 600 amp service but have so far decided to take a wait and see position.

The reason for this is that the trustees have done two surveys with unit owners and consulted some experts and have determined that so far there has not been any safety risk signs such as brownouts, sparks at outlets, and devices or appliances being warmer than usual to the touch when plugged in.

I'm mentioning all this to see whether other condo owners have been dealing with any challenges posed by climate change.

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Comments (3)

3onthetree
4 years ago
The 200amp service for the entire building is probably misunderstood. No way could 12 furnaces, water heaters, refs, microwaves, and/or toaster ovens work on 200amps. You probably have a 200amp service for common areas for the building, and each unit has their own service of 100amp (maybe 60amp if old).

The basement flooding issue is a localized one. Certainly climate change causes more severe storms, but that issue is still for that unit or the entire property. If you have water problems, then that should be addressed regardless of whether it used to happen once every 10 years or now 3 times a season because of changing weather patterns.
Elmer J Fudd
4 years ago
Any building located at the bottom of a hill needs to have had drainage features and a system designed and engineered in advance of construction to handle the expected runoff and saturated ground. As part of the building plan. It sounds like the problem could be that the drainage design was inadequate, was improperly built, or has deteriorated.

No matter what the reason, fixing the problem needs expertise. I hope you're able to engage the right resources to assess the problems and fix them. From your brief description, that's your immediate need. Leave dealing with climate change as a topic for cocktail party chit chat.
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Joe Fisherman
Original Author
4 years ago
Folks,

Thanks for the feedback so far.

Clarification on the electrical situation: The building has a 200 amp service. This means that the building gets a maximum of 200 amps at any given time. There are individual electrical panels for each of the 12 units. Each panel pulls in about 60 to 100 amps at any given time. When the trustees were looking into this whole issue last year, they informed us that: "It is theoretically possible for the demand from the individual units to vastly outstrip our 200 amp capacity if usage spikes across all units at the same time (e.g., 12 x 60 = 720 amps)." So far, according to a survey done in the building, electrical usage is not to the level where it's a safety issue. But this will need to be monitored yearly.