Draft, not yet released. In stewardship review. Not indexed until the first approved release.

Risks and capability

Four regional risk objects open the portfolio. Order carries no rank. Each is read across driver, exposure, vulnerability, capacity, cascade and consequence; loss metrics are added only where they can be modelled.

5 min read0 figures1 table16 notesNR-REGIONAL-NAM-2026-BASELINE

Contents
  1. ·Edition home
  2. ·Executive summary
  3. 1North America’s risk travels through shared rivers, grids and pipelines
  4. 2Key findings
  5. 3Systems and sectors at baseline
  6. 4Risks and capability
    1. 4.1 Risk objects
    2. 4.2 Capability ladder
  7. 5Dry, hot summer across the Colorado and Rio Grande basins and the southern grids
  8. 6Readings from the other desks
  9. 7The 2027 agenda
  10. 8Systems in depth
  11. AMethodology
  12. BData appendix
  13. CReferences and record
  14. ·Complete edition, for print

4.1Risk objects

Each risk is read across the chain from hazard to consequence, with its status and evidence-quality level.

  1. ReportedEQL 4RSK-NAM-CLI-001

    Cross-border wildfire and smoke season

    Driver
    heat, drought and ignition on dry fuels
    Exposure
    forest-edge communities, air quality across borders
    Vulnerability
    evacuation capacity not bound
    Capacity
    international firefighter exchange; documented22
    Cascade
    CLI → HLT, INF, FIN
    Horizon
    annual

  2. InferredEQL 3RSK-NAM-WAT-002

    Low Colorado River and Rio Grande supply in a dry year

    Driver
    low snowpack and high demand
    Exposure
    cities, irrigated farms, hydropower
    Vulnerability
    reliance on two large reservoirs; levels at the close not bound
    Capacity
    federal decision framework and treaty terms1935; performance not bound
    Cascade
    WAT → ENE, FOO
    Horizon
    1–5 years

  3. InferredEQL 3RSK-NAM-HLT-003

    Heat and smoke overload of health services

    Driver
    heat waves and smoke episodes
    Exposure
    older adults9; outdoor workers
    Vulnerability
    limited cooling; workforce not bound
    Capacity
    health system capacity not bound
    Cascade
    CLI → HLT → ENE peak
    Horizon
    seasonal

  4. Expert inputEQL 2RSK-NAM-ENE-004

    Gas or grid disruption during extreme weather

    Driver
    cold or heat extreme, supply interruption or a trade rule change
    Exposure
    power, industry, heating, Mexican gas supply25
    Vulnerability
    storage depth and cross-border flows not bound
    Capacity
    reliability organisation assessments exist30; text not read
    Cascade
    TRD → ENE → FOO, FIN
    Horizon
    1–5 years

4.2Capability ladder

Existence is not readiness. Each of the fifteen capability functions is placed on the ladder by the strongest public evidence at the regional level, from a policy listing to performance in real events.

Table 4.1Capabilities on the ladder of evidence: listed, exists, demonstrated, tested
FunctionRungLevelStrongest public evidence at baseline
Prevention and mitigationEXISTSnational inventories and reduction reporting are published1416
Monitoring and observationEXISTSstatistical series are published1; reservoir and drought records are not bound at the close
Early warningNOT BOUNDsource: weather and flood-warning services · blocker: not retrieved
Preparedness and planningLISTEDColorado River decision record and 2027 to 2028 guidelines issued19; delivery not bound
Redundancy and reservesNOT BOUNDsource: gas storage and reserve margin data · blocker: not retrieved
ResponseNOT BOUNDsource: after-action records for fire and drought events · blocker: not retrieved
Continuity of critical servicesLISTEDreliability organisation exists30; performance not bound
RecoveryNOT BOUNDsource: recovery agency and insurer records · blocker: not retrieved
AdaptationLISTEDinternational water treaties and commissions exist273536; delivery not bound
Social protectionNOT BOUNDsource: income-support and disaster-payment records · blocker: not reviewed
Finance and insuranceNOT BOUNDsource: insurer and reinsurer loss data3133 · blocker: not retrieved
Institutional coordinationEXISTSthe International Joint Commission and the boundary and water commission exist2327; performance not bound
Technical infrastructureNOT BOUNDsource: asset-condition registers · blocker: not published
WorkforceNOT BOUNDsource: health and emergency workforce registers · blocker: not retrieved
Research capacityEXISTSpeer-reviewed compound-event and nexus research is published4142
A capability listed in policy is not a tested one; each rung is the strongest public evidence at baseline.

Notes

Numbers are the edition’s reference numbers, so a note reads the same in every chapter. The full list, with every source and its licence, is in Annex C. Annex C, references

  1. 22UNVERIFIED, not opened: Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre (ed.), 2025 national season statistics (more than 7.5 million hectares by mid-August, second-largest area in the federal record; taken from search summaries because the statistics page was refused). CIFFC, Winnipeg. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  2. 19U.S. Bureau of Reclamation (ed.), Post-2026 Colorado River reservoir operations (page updated 3 September 2026: draft EIS 9 January 2026, final EIS 31 July 2026, record of decision 21 August 2026, 2007 interim guidelines and 2019 drought contingency plans expiring at the end of 2026). Reclamation, Washington DC. Observation year 2026. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  3. 35UNVERIFIED, not opened: Governments of Mexico and the United States (eds.), Treaty on the utilisation of waters of the Colorado and Tijuana Rivers and of the Rio Grande, 1944 (taken from memory). Treaty text, 1944. Observation year 1944. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  4. 9World Bank (ed.), World Development Indicators: population aged 65 and above, share of total (SP.POP.65UP.TO.ZS), and life expectancy at birth (SP.DYN.LE00.IN), Canada, Mexico and United States. World Bank, Washington DC. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  5. 25U.S. Energy Information Administration (ed.), U.S. natural gas pipeline exports by country (Mexico 2,422,839 and Canada 1,033,487 million cubic feet in 2025). EIA, Washington DC. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  6. 30UNVERIFIED, not opened: North American Electric Reliability Corporation (ed.), Long-term reliability assessment (the page opened gave only a headline fragment about regions at elevated risk). NERC, Atlanta. Observation year 2026. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  7. 14Environment and Climate Change Canada (ed.), Greenhouse gas emissions (Canadian Environmental Sustainability Indicators): 685 Mt CO2 eq in 2024, 10.3% below 2005 and 0.3% below 2023. Government of Canada, Gatineau. Observation year 2024. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  8. 16United States Environmental Protection Agency (ed.), Inventory of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions and sinks (page opened reports 1990 to 2022: gross 6,343 and net 5,489 million metric tons CO2e, net 17% below 2005). EPA, Washington DC. Observation year 2022. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  9. 1DATA VINTAGE AFTER CLOSE: World Bank (ed.), World Development Indicators: Population, total (SP.POP.TOTL), Canada, Mexico and United States, retrieved through the World Bank indicators interface (last updated 2026-10-08). World Bank, Washington DC. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  10. 27International Joint Commission (ed.), Mission: prevents and resolves disputes between Canada and the United States under the Boundary Waters Treaty of 1909; three commissioners from each country. IJC, Ottawa and Washington DC. Observation year 2026. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  11. 36UNVERIFIED, not opened: Governments of the United States and Great Britain for Canada (eds.), Boundary Waters Treaty, 1909 (taken from memory; the commission page opened confirms the year). Treaty text, 1909. Observation year 1909. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  12. 31NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (ed.), U.S. billion-dollar weather and climate disasters (page opened returned no figures). NOAA NCEI, Asheville. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  13. 33UNVERIFIED, not opened: Insurance Bureau of Canada (ed.), insured catastrophe losses (the page requested returned not found). IBC, Toronto. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  14. 23International Boundary and Water Commission (ed.), Mexico deliveries of Rio Grande water (page opened states the 350,000 acre-feet a year minimum, 1,750,000 acre-feet per five-year cycle and a cycle start of 25 October 2020; delivery graphs not readable). IBWC, El Paso. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  15. 41UNVERIFIED, not opened: P. D. McElwee, P. A. Harrison, T. L. van Huysen et al. (eds.), Thematic Assessment Report on the Interlinkages among Biodiversity, Water, Food and Health. IPBES secretariat, Bonn, 2024. Observation year 2024. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  16. 42UNVERIFIED, not opened: J. Zscheischler, S. Westra, B. J. J. M. van den Hurk et al., “Future climate risk from compound events,” Nature Climate Change, vol. 8, pp. 469–477, 2018. Observation year 2018. Accessed 2026-11-03.back

Cite this chapter

Valadbaygi, S. (Ed.). (2026). Chapter 4: Risks and capability. In North America Regional Systems Risk and Resilience Report 2026: Baseline Edition, The State of North America’s Interdependent Systems. (Baseline Edition 2026, Report No. NR-REGIONAL-NAM-2026-BASELINE) [Draft under review]. The Global Centre for Risk and Innovation (GCRI).

Every citation form of the whole report, BibTeX and RIS included, is on the edition home. Cite this report

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