Keith Porter

Keith Porter is a research professor in structural engineering and structural mechanics at the University of Colorado Boulder and principal of the consulting company SPA Risk LLC. He is a licensed professional engineer with degrees in civil and structural engineering from UC Davis, UC Berkeley, and Stanford University. He specializes in 2nd-generation performance based earthquake engineering, seismic vulnerability, and societal risk from natural disasters. He helped lead the National Institute of Building Science's Natural Hazard Mitigation Saves study that estimated that FEMA-funded mitigation saves $4 per $1 spent. He leads the current effort to update and expand that study. He led the engineering efforts of the USGS Science Application for Risk Reduction scenarios ShakeOut earthquake scenario, ARkStorm severe winter storm scenario, SAFRR Tsunami Scenario, and the HayWired earthquake scenario. He led or participated in numerous interdisciplinary research and applied studies, and believes that they produced far more societal resilience than engineers working alone could accomplish. For more information, see http://spot.colorado.edu/~porterka and www.sparisk.com.