My Neighbor Affects Me: Co-Creating Wildfire Resilience
39,090 wildfires later…we sat down for a conversation with Alister Watt to find out how community led fire resilience can be built from the ground up.
My Neighbor Affects Me: Co-Creating Wildfire Resilience
Climate Realism by the Numbers
If you haven’t been tracking the number of wildfires burning across the U.S, get your surprise face ready. As of mid-July, the U.S. recorded 39,090 wildfires this year alone. That is a 34.83% spike compared to a decade ago.
For those of us building, working, and volunteering in the communities impacted by these fires, the old “business as usual” model is played out. Why do we keep allowing our homes to be destroyed instead of just building fire-resistant communities?
This is a systemic problem that doesn’t discriminate. Anyone with a home is vulnerable to losing out big when the wildfires of climate change comes knocking.
And, if you don’t protect your neighborhood, who will?
We spoke with Alister Watt, Chief Product Officer at the Insurance Institute for Business and Home Safety, to find out more about how individuals can come together to form a more perfect safety net–or, should we say, fire escape?
Translating Climate Science Into Local Action
We all know that building your community with a fire-resistant infrastructure is a good thing. But how do we actually build it? Alister Watt has the answers.
The Insurance Institute for Business & Home Safety (IBHS) is an organization that bridges the gap between rigorous research and grassroots execution.
Rather than treating disaster relief as an afterthought, their team focuses entirely on preventing avoidable suffering by strengthening local homes and businesses.
Two of their core frameworks offer a blueprint for how we should be thinking about community-wide safety infrastructure:
The Wildfire Prepared Home Program: A science-backed framework that helps property owners systematically reinforce their structures against ember storms and wildfire exposure.
The FORTIFIED Standard: A scalable product design methodology focused on reinforcing physical buildings to withstand severe weather events.
The Mindset Shift: Mutual Protection Over Siloed Solutions
Here is the core truth for ethical builders: Wildfire safety is a network effect.
If a single homeowner fireproofs their property using IBHS standards, that is a great individual step. But if the surrounding neighborhood remains vulnerable, the entire system is still at risk.
True community safety requires a shared, collaborative mindset where everyone plays a distinct role:
Public Recognition & Incentives: Homeowners who invest time and capital into fire-proofing their properties shouldn’t do it in isolation. They need to be recognized, incentivized, and celebrated by local networks, insurance providers, and neighborhood associations to build positive social momentum.
Open-Source Innovation: Non-profits and community-oriented startups can leverage open research—like the disaster guides provided by IBHS—to build hyper-local alert apps, smarter supply chain tools, or mutual aid networks.
Coordinating Action: By viewing our neighborhoods as interconnected ecosystems, we can co-create localized fire-mitigation plans where neighbors help neighbors clear dry brush, audit home vulnerabilities, and share resources.
How Are You Disrupting Climate Risk?
We don’t need more corporate PR campaigns; we need functional, systemic disruptions. Whether you are building an eco-conscious tech stack, managing an impact-driven non-profit, or just trying to make your own block more resilient, your perspective is vital.
Get involved in the conversation:
Explore the blueprints: Check out the customized toolkit options on RebelBase to see how you can optimize your organization’s, business’s, or community’s environmental impact goals.
Collaborate with us: Are you working on a green tech product, a community safety initiative, or an ethical business model? Then we are dying to talk with you!! Make sure to Join the Conversation with other innovators from across the world over at Democratizing Innovation Institute.