Short Overview on International Historic Climate Adaptation of Built Heritage to Natural Hazards: lessons for Norway

Abstract

This paper aims to highlight the relevance of ancient international adaptation measures of built heritage and how can they be relevant and applied to Norway. Specifically, it will focus on historic measures applied to mitigate extreme hazards (fire and floods) and slow degradation (decay) of built heritage. For this, we used the scientific database Google Scholar (GS) and 20 papers and reports were deemed relevant for our analysis. There is a limited body of literature (in English) addressing decay and fire, but a richer one referring to floods. The analysis highlights the fact that there is a gap between theory and practice within contemporary adaptation measures (which is also highlighted by previous studies). It was also shown that historic climate adaptation measures are passed on through generations and traditions, rather than scientific research, a finding also supported by UNESCO.