Fires, earthquakes, hurricanes—buildings have to stand up to a lot. New construction methods and materials have improved the strength and fire safety of today’s buildings dramatically. NIST paves the way for such advances by developing test methods that accurately predict the performance of new materials under real world conditions.

Still, economic losses to the nation from recent natural disasters exceed $100 billion per year. As a neutral, non-regulatory agency, NIST helps reduce these losses by developing measurement methods that are accepted by both industry and government regulators alike.