2026 Request for Proposals: Grand Challenges in Climate Change

"Climate Impacts on Fire Protection Engineering"

Up to $30,000 USD available

Deadline: 11:59 pm ET on Wednesday, October 14, 2026

Background & Motivation

As part of our commitment to addressing the research priorities identified in the SFPE Research Roadmap and the SFPE Foundation’s Grand Challenges Initiative (GCI), we invite proposals that address the impact of climate on fire engineering design. The GCI white paper, “Grand Challenges in Climate Change: A 10-Year Plan for Strategic Cooperation in Research and Education to Advance Fire Engineering,” established the urgent need for the fire engineering community to adapt its practices for a changing world.

The fundamental environmental conditions that have long served as a baseline for fire engineering design are changing. Shifting weather patterns, changes in vegetation and fuel loads, and the introduction of new building technologies (among other factors) are creating a new reality where historical data may no longer be sufficient for ensuring fire safety and resilience. This impact manifests as a direct alteration of fire hazards, which are expected to increase in severity or frequency, while new hazards are likely to appear in regions of the world that were previously considered immune. Adapting professional fire engineering methods requires a foundational understanding of these evolving risks.

However, a significant gap exists between acknowledging these impacts and integrating them into daily fire engineering practice. Before fire engineering design can evolve and adapt, the effects of climate on fire behavior, engineering practice, and design must be systematically identified, assessed, characterized, and quantified. This research is needed to provide engineers with the updated data and methodologies required to design safe and resilient structures in the 21st century.

This RFP: Climate Impacts on Fire Protection Engineering

To meet this challenge, the SFPE Foundation, with the support of the GCI Climate Change Working Group, envisions a multi-year research initiative consisting of two sequential projects:

1. Project 1 (this RFP) - Landscape Analysis & Hazard Quantification:
   1. Perform a broad landscape analysis of existing research on the impact of climate on fire engineering design principles and methodologies, including a description of underlying assumptions and potential cascading impacts.
   2. Systematically assess and quantify how specific climate factors (e.g., higher temperatures, prolonged droughts, higher winds, electrification, etc.) are altering (and will alter) fire hazards relevant to the built environment.
   3. Systematically assess and quantify how specific climate adaptations (i.e., sustainability efforts such as electrification, green facades, etc.) are altering (and will alter) fire hazards relevant to the built environment.
2. Project 2 (future RFP) – Framework Development & Design Integration: Using findings and recommendations from Project 1:
   1. Develop fire protection engineering frameworks and methodologies that address the identified changes in the fire hazard landscape. regulators (i.e identify potential updates to existing prescriptive codes, develop new performance-based design approaches, adapt risk assessment methodologies, etc).
   2. Provide actionable recommendations tailored to the relevant stakeholders (practitioners, research institutions, codes and standards, regulatory agencies, etc.).

This Request for Proposals is specifically for Project 1. The outcomes of Project 1 will directly inform Project 2, making them complementary arcs within a multi-year effort. Respondents will be differentiated by their proposed approaches to the required elements above. We envision this project as an exploratory endeavor that will establish future directions for research and educational funding based on the needs identified by the selected research team and the potential impact that additional projects could have in addressing fire safety design challenges in the context of a changing climate. Furthermore, for this proposal, we require that the respondent team includes a member with climate science expertise on the project team, or defines clear collaboration with climate science experts in some form as part of their proposal.

Please note: The above action items are meant to encompass fire hazards in the broadest possible sense. While we acknowledge that wildland and wildland-urban interface (WUI) fires are a part of this issue, they are not the only component, and we are asking that proposals be as broad as possible so as not to limit the scope only to wildland and/or WUI fires. RFPs unique to the WUI/wildland fire issue are expected to be issued separately. Indeed, we specifically welcome proposals that focus on the implications of a changing climate for fire protection engineering design in the built environment, and that only secondarily consider WUI fires as an instance of how changing climate conditions may affect the WUI fire hazard.

Additionally, proposals should not be limited in geographic scope. We seek broad geographic representation and expect respondents to address this in their proposals. We welcome proposals from groups or individuals, though we strongly encourage collaborative proposals that leverage the strengths of multiple researchers and/or organizations working together.

Download the complete RFP, with additional information regarding the call and specific required elements below. 

Up to $30,000 (USD) may be awarded. 

ALL proposals must be submitted via the Foundation's Blackbaud Grants Management System, linked in the button below.

Complete proposals are due by 11:59 pm ET on Wednesday, October 14, 2026.