Climate is one of the factors that affect infrastructure development and its longevity. The Asian Civil Engineering Coordinating Council (ACECC) organized the virtual conference on this vision two years ago. Let’s see what the vision is and how it will help in infrastructure development.
Infrastructure Vision 2050
The ACECC, American Society of Civil Engineers, and the World Federation of Engineering Organizations organized the ASCE India Section Conference to share, network, and look into the infrastructure sector and ensure the civil engineering profession.
The organizations had shared this vision 2050 related to climate resilience, equity, and sustainability. The conference was organized in 2023 with the world leaders and delegates from India. The conference and events like this are organized to bring engineers together and recognize the ethical responsibility to build resilient, safe, and sustainable infrastructure.
The vision shared the view that by 2050 the climate change will accelerate, such as floods, cyclones, and others, affecting the infrastructure, so the engineers need to turn to climate-resilient infrastructure practices that will be environmentally friendly.
What does the Vision 20250 imply?
The vision is established on the four pillars to improve the infrastructure system, practices to handle risky projects, and promote environmentally friendly infrastructure. Let’s understand each pillar of the Vision 2050 to understand how important it is:
- Climate Resilience:
- Recently, the International Transport Forum (ITF 2025) reported how climate change is affecting the infrastructure. The ADB also reported that the natural disasters are affecting infrastructure development more; around $126 million loss was endured by the ADB’s 45 developing countries during 2006 and 2015.
- The loss due to climate change will escalate more in the future; hence, it’s important that as we move forward in improving the infrastructure sector, we should adapt to the green infrastructure models that will combat climate change.
- The green infrastructure means that inducing practices that can safeguard the infrastructure from natural disasters, such as road embankments to deal with floods, adding proper water intake systems in vulnerable areas, and focusing on maintenance of the infrastructure.
- Sustainable Infrastructure:
- The vision prioritizes strategies that focus on sustainable infrastructure practices and highlight engineering standards that can achieve that.
- The ACECC promotes the use of renewable energy for sustainable development, along with innovating green infrastructure practices with smart technology to enhance efficiency and resilience.
- Sustainable infrastructure is already expanding in many parts of Asia, and Vietnam and Indonesia are following the green and grey infrastructure features, such as solar, wind, and many more, that are transforming infrastructure development.
- Equitable:
- The equitable term in the vision focuses on fair and equal distribution of infrastructure benefits and burden to all communities, and improves the standard of living while also safeguarding them.
- This part of the vision promotes universal access to all facilities, prioritizes the requirements of the regions and communities, so that all communities can benefit.
- Must meet the diverse needs:
- The vision focuses on designing, planning, and supporting infrastructure that meets the diverse needs of all groups of society.
- The organization promotes the engineer to take a long-term approach that meets society’s needs and fosters economic growth.
What initiatives has ACECC taken to follow the vision?
Organizations like ASCE, ACECC, and others take time-to-time initiatives to promote and share the vision among their community and encourage engineering professionals to focus more on the future growth.
The ACECC has been organizing multiple events, conferences in different parts of Asia every year, like CECAR 10, and has multiple technical committees to look into various matters, such as:
- River Management
- Disaster Mitigation
- Design Codes in the Asian Region
- Infrastructure Report Card
- Sustainable Infrastructure
- Ethical Practices related to Infrastructure
- Renewable Energy for Sustainable Development
- Gender and Development in Infrastructure
- Policy framework recommendation for improving the infrastructure
- Green Energy in Wind Engineering and many more.
Upcoming Event of ACECC in Asia
If you follow the ACECC initiatives and talk about the sustainable, climate-resilient, and other infrastructure development for the future, you can attend the upcoming event and get great insight from the industry’s top leaders. Here is the list of upcoming events of ACECC that you can follow up on:
- “CECAR 10” during October 21–24, 2025, at ICC, Jeju, South Korea.
- “49th Executive Committee Meeting,” October 21, 2025, Jeju, South Korea.
The upcoming event of ACECC will discuss the advanced infrastructure practices that would meet the 2050 vision. The CECAR 10 will bring top leaders from the engineering profession, research and development, academia, and others, so let’s see what ACECC and other organizations take on the current situation and infrastructure gaps.
