Day 2 of the Sustainability Symposium 2026 will tackle reimagining risk, resilience, and capital allocation.
We are entering a period where the old math no longer works. The assumptions that once underpinned housing, insurance, finance, and development were built for a world with stable climate patterns, predictable energy costs, abundant resources, and relatively linear economic risk. That world no longer exists.
Today, risk is becoming more volatile, more interconnected, and more expensive. Insurance premiums are climbing. Infrastructure is under pressure. Capital markets are recalibrating around climate exposure and long-term performance. At the same time, consumers are redefining what they value in homes and communities, prioritizing durability, resilience, efficiency, health, and stability over superficial upgrades and short-term optics.
And yet, many of the systems we use to evaluate success, from underwriting models to valuation metrics to development strategies, still reflect outdated assumptions about cost, growth, and risk.
Before we dive in, I’m excited to announce an addition to Day 1: Building on the Edge, a fast-paced, unscripted conversation featuring building industry pros Megan Cordes, Brandon Bryant, and Rob Howard. These VISION House builders will share what it actually takes to lead a building company through uncertainty in today’s market.
Three Short Hours: A Full Education
We’ll begin with internationally esteemed sustainability strategist and author Andrew Winston and his session, “New Rules and Risk Models: Fixing the Math,” during which Winston will examine the growing gap between traditional economic thinking and the realities of today’s market, exploring how leading organizations are beginning to rethink value, risk, and long-term performance.
Rather than treating sustainability as a compliance exercise or brand strategy, forward-looking companies are increasingly integrating it directly into operational systems, financial models, and strategic planning.
This session will challenge participants to rethink the very definition of success. What happens when markets begin rewarding durability instead of disposability? Stability instead of volatility? Long-term performance instead of short-term extraction? Winston will explore how concepts like cost certainty, net positive strategic planning, and systems-based thinking have become competitive advantages.
From there, award-winning investigative journalist Laura Sullivan will take us to the frontlines in “Resilience Is the New Affordability.” For years, resilience has often been framed as a luxury upgrade or a future-facing aspiration. Sullivan will argue that it is now something much more immediate: a prerequisite for financial durability and long-term security.
This session will examine what happens when housing systems are not designed to withstand the realities of a changing world, from climate disasters and infrastructure failure to insurance instability and displacement. Sullivan’s reporting has consistently exposed the hidden costs embedded in broken systems, and her perspective brings urgency and humanity to a conversation that is often treated too abstractly.
We’ll close Day 2 with “Land, Capital, and the Long View: Rethinking Value from the Ground Up,” featuring regenerative real estate expert Neal Collins alongside Tom Hoban, CEO of Kitson & Partners, one of the housing industry’s pioneering sustainability-focused developers.
For decades, land has largely been treated as a commodity—subdivided, optimized, monetized, and leveraged for short-term gain. But that model is beginning to show its limits as communities confront climate pressures, resource constraints, and growing demand for connection, resilience, and quality of life.
Collins and Hoban will explore a different approach rooted in stewardship, regeneration, and long-term value creation. Drawing from their work at the intersection of development, conservation, and investment, they will examine how place-based strategies can unlock not just financial returns, but ecological and social resilience as well.
This conversation gets to the heart of a larger shift underway across the economy: the movement away from extractive systems built around transactions and toward regenerative systems built around outcomes.
Taken together, Day 2 of the Symposium will delve into new ways of measuring value, pricing risk, defining prosperity, and, most importantly, creating new resilient systems to support sustainable growth.
Join The Reckoning
The Sustainability Symposium 2026: Systems Reckoning will offer a rigorous, honest, and forward-looking conversation about what comes next.
If you are thinking seriously about where housing, finance, energy, insurance, and development are heading and how to position yourself and your organization in a rapidly shifting environment, this is a conversation worth being part of.
As cofounder and CEO of Green Builder Media, Sara is a visionary thought leader and passionate advocate for sustainability. A former venture capitalist, she has participated in the life cycle (from funding to exit) of over 20 companies, with an emphasis on combining sustainability and profitability. She lives in Lake City, Colo., with her husband, where she is an avid long-distance runner, snowboarder, and Crossfit trainer. She is also on the Board of Directors at Dvele, runs the Rural Segment for Energize Colorado, and is a former County Commissioner.
Solutions for When the Old Math Breaks
Day 2 of the Sustainability Symposium 2026 will tackle reimagining risk, resilience, and capital allocation.
We are entering a period where the old math no longer works. The assumptions that once underpinned housing, insurance, finance, and development were built for a world with stable climate patterns, predictable energy costs, abundant resources, and relatively linear economic risk. That world no longer exists.
Today, risk is becoming more volatile, more interconnected, and more expensive. Insurance premiums are climbing. Infrastructure is under pressure. Capital markets are recalibrating around climate exposure and long-term performance. At the same time, consumers are redefining what they value in homes and communities, prioritizing durability, resilience, efficiency, health, and stability over superficial upgrades and short-term optics.
And yet, many of the systems we use to evaluate success, from underwriting models to valuation metrics to development strategies, still reflect outdated assumptions about cost, growth, and risk.
That disconnect is exactly what we’ll explore on Day 2 of the Sustainability Symposium 2026: Systems Reckoning.
Before we dive in, I’m excited to announce an addition to Day 1: Building on the Edge, a fast-paced, unscripted conversation featuring building industry pros Megan Cordes, Brandon Bryant, and Rob Howard. These VISION House builders will share what it actually takes to lead a building company through uncertainty in today’s market.
Three Short Hours: A Full Education
We’ll begin with internationally esteemed sustainability strategist and author Andrew Winston and his session, “New Rules and Risk Models: Fixing the Math,” during which Winston will examine the growing gap between traditional economic thinking and the realities of today’s market, exploring how leading organizations are beginning to rethink value, risk, and long-term performance.
Rather than treating sustainability as a compliance exercise or brand strategy, forward-looking companies are increasingly integrating it directly into operational systems, financial models, and strategic planning.
This session will challenge participants to rethink the very definition of success. What happens when markets begin rewarding durability instead of disposability? Stability instead of volatility? Long-term performance instead of short-term extraction? Winston will explore how concepts like cost certainty, net positive strategic planning, and systems-based thinking have become competitive advantages.
From there, award-winning investigative journalist Laura Sullivan will take us to the frontlines in “Resilience Is the New Affordability.” For years, resilience has often been framed as a luxury upgrade or a future-facing aspiration. Sullivan will argue that it is now something much more immediate: a prerequisite for financial durability and long-term security.
This session will examine what happens when housing systems are not designed to withstand the realities of a changing world, from climate disasters and infrastructure failure to insurance instability and displacement. Sullivan’s reporting has consistently exposed the hidden costs embedded in broken systems, and her perspective brings urgency and humanity to a conversation that is often treated too abstractly.
We’ll close Day 2 with “Land, Capital, and the Long View: Rethinking Value from the Ground Up,” featuring regenerative real estate expert Neal Collins alongside Tom Hoban, CEO of Kitson & Partners, one of the housing industry’s pioneering sustainability-focused developers.
For decades, land has largely been treated as a commodity—subdivided, optimized, monetized, and leveraged for short-term gain. But that model is beginning to show its limits as communities confront climate pressures, resource constraints, and growing demand for connection, resilience, and quality of life.
Collins and Hoban will explore a different approach rooted in stewardship, regeneration, and long-term value creation. Drawing from their work at the intersection of development, conservation, and investment, they will examine how place-based strategies can unlock not just financial returns, but ecological and social resilience as well.
This conversation gets to the heart of a larger shift underway across the economy: the movement away from extractive systems built around transactions and toward regenerative systems built around outcomes.
Taken together, Day 2 of the Symposium will delve into new ways of measuring value, pricing risk, defining prosperity, and, most importantly, creating new resilient systems to support sustainable growth.
Join The Reckoning
The Sustainability Symposium 2026: Systems Reckoning will offer a rigorous, honest, and forward-looking conversation about what comes next.
If you are thinking seriously about where housing, finance, energy, insurance, and development are heading and how to position yourself and your organization in a rapidly shifting environment, this is a conversation worth being part of.
Step into the conversation. Register today.
By Sara Gutterman
As cofounder and CEO of Green Builder Media, Sara is a visionary thought leader and passionate advocate for sustainability. A former venture capitalist, she has participated in the life cycle (from funding to exit) of over 20 companies, with an emphasis on combining sustainability and profitability. She lives in Lake City, Colo., with her husband, where she is an avid long-distance runner, snowboarder, and Crossfit trainer. She is also on the Board of Directors at Dvele, runs the Rural Segment for Energize Colorado, and is a former County Commissioner.Also Read