The Center for Disaster Preparedness (the Center) has launched Labs, a new innovation platform designed to accelerate practical solutions to help governments better plan, finance and respond to disasters.
Conor Meenan will lead the initiative as Laboratory Director.
As modern disasters continue to increase in scale and complexity, traditional reactive financing models have proven insufficient. Labs aims to close this gap by working closely with governments and partners to co-design open, practical tools to improve disaster preparedness and risk financing.
By bringing together government policymakers, technical experts and practitioners, the Lab aims to develop solutions grounded in real policy needs and designed for use in real-world decision-making and solution design.
“Disasters are becoming more frequent, more complex and more costly,” Meenan said. At the same time, disaster risk financing remains technically complex. Countries face difficult questions such as how to estimate the full financial cost of a disaster, when to mobilize funds, and how to choose the right mix of financing instruments. While tools and knowledge exist, they are often fragmented, difficult to access, or not designed for practical use in policy development.
“We aim to close this gap by co-designing open, scalable solutions that help countries (and partners) better understand financial risks, make informed decisions about financing options, and ensure that funds can flow quickly when disaster strikes.”
Labs is guided by three principles: bold, open and grounded. This means prioritizing solutions for the scale and complexity of modern disasters; working collaboratively and sharing knowledge openly; and developing tools rooted in real policy and business needs to accelerate effective and scalable pre-arranged disaster risk financing.
Labs has begun working with partners on its first portfolio of projects in 2026, making tools and resources available online for free during development.
The innovation platform will focus on providing open, scalable solutions that can be adapted to different countries and environments.
Initial areas of exploration include tools to help governments quantify disaster financial risks, designing effective disaster financing parameter triggers, and comparing options for building disaster risk financing instruments.
Daniel Clarke, Executive Director of the Center for Disaster Protection, said: “I am delighted that Conor has taken over the role of leading Labs. He has deep expertise in disaster risk financing and a proven track record of working with clients to develop practical solutions. Labs will launch a powerful set of efforts in 2026 that will help accelerate the development of open, scalable tools to strengthen the way countries plan for and pay for disasters.”
“Through initiatives like the Lab, the Center continues to play a leading role in advancing innovation in disaster risk financing and developing practical solutions to strengthen the world’s ability to respond to increasingly complex risks.”
