---
title: "launch your city's resilience marketplace"
canonical_url: https://ensurance.app/guide/launch-your-citys-resilience-marketplace
markdown_url: https://ensurance.app/guide/launch-your-citys-resilience-marketplace.md
subtitle: "what we set up, what it costs, what it funds, what happens after, and what it is not"
category: how-to
---

# launch your city's resilience marketplace

*what we set up, what it costs, what it funds, what happens after, and what it is not*

Your adaptation plan names places: the canopy on the hottest ward, the marsh, the floodplain, the creek buffer. This post is the offer for funding them. It is for a city's climate, heat or resilience office, and for the regional body that serves a group of covenant towns. It says what we would set up, what it costs on our public rate card, what it funds, how a payor pays, what happens after, and what it is not.

Those places do their work whether or not a city lists them. A resilience marketplace is how the parties who carry the risk pay for them before the damage. Ensurance is the rails a city can use instead of building its own. Neither is the worth of the marsh.

:::johnson
**one city, one market, one account per project, yours to run.** We set up the rails and the first lines. Your city keeps the list, the screening and the payors.

[talk to us about your city →](/contact?from=guide&topic=city-resilience-marketplace)
:::

## who this is for

The buyer is the office that owns the adaptation plan. In a C40 city (about 100 cities, more than 582 million people) that is usually a chief resilience officer, a climate office or a heat office. In a Global Covenant of Mayors signatory it is whoever wrote the risk and vulnerability assessment and the adaptation plan built on it. For small towns the buyer is the regional body that serves them; [the post before this one](/guide/a-town-joins-its-regions-resilience-market?from=guide) explains why.

Two readers sit either side. The **payor** (a utility, an insurer with the city's book, a port, a hospital, a large employer) funds the work. The **steward** (a parks department, a land trust, a community group, a property owner) does it and is paid on the split.

## the exposure: the risk is already paid for, after

Many risks in an adaptation plan have a party that pays after the damage: a utility for an outage, an insurer for a claim, a hospital for heat admissions, a port for a closed berth, for example. These are roles, not figures from any city, and the places that lower the risk usually sit outside those budgets.

Public agencies already count what those places do. FEMA's green infrastructure values (July 2025 text, in 2021 dollars) put one urban tree at $1,048.86 a year in benefits, $910.28 of it heat risk, mostly on the value of a statistical life (the figure agencies use in cost-benefit work for avoided deaths). That is FEMA's method for weighing a project, not a price anyone pays. Cities already run markets for a unit of risk reduction, too. Washington DC runs Stormwater Retention Credits: one credit is one gallon of retention for a year, private parties negotiate the price, the in-lieu fee acts as a ceiling and a price lock program as a floor. Neither FEMA nor DC is a client of ours. Both show public bodies already counting risk reduction, and DC lets private parties trade it. The payor's own exposure number lives in its books and your assessment; we do not supply one.

## city climate adaptation funding on ensurance

Two services carry the offer. Both are on [our services page](/services?from=guide#finance) with public ranges in US dollars, and both move inside their range by the size of the town or region. The exact number is set when we scope it with you.

| service | what you get | range on the card | moves with |
|---|---|---|---|
| **Ensurance deployment** | We do it all for you: the valuation of the listed places, the certificate lines minted, the payors mapped and asked, the MRV clause (how the work is monitored, reported and verified), and the steward named on each split | $15,000–$50,000 | The size of the town or region |
| **The program** | 12–24 months of running it: certificates issued, MRV run, payors convened, quarterly reports | $1,000–$4,000 a month, plus the premium flow from the certificates, set out at scoping | The size of the town or region |

If you want every natural asset the city or region depends on valued first, the same page lists a **regional natural asset analysis** at $10,000–$15,000, by the size of the town or region. [How a city values the nature it already owns](/guide/how-a-city-values-the-nature-it-already-owns?from=guide) covers that step.

What the deployment sets up, on rails that are live today:

- **A group in your city's name**, such as `.{city}`: recommended, not minted. It is minted only once you say go and the application is reviewed. Live groups such as [Mumbai's](/groups/mumbai?from=guide) (22 agents on 4 November 2026) show what the page looks like.
- **An account per listed project**, holding money in the project's own name, apart from the city's general fund and the next project.
- **A certificate line per project**: the thing a payor buys, and the record that a named payor funded named work at a named place.
- **Proceeds on a split**, with the steward named on it.
- **A public record** of every account, certificate and payment in public.

**A front end in your city's brand** is scoped at contact; we have not delivered one for any city. Fiat or invoice checkout is also scoped at contact, and projects do not list themselves without review.

## the living work it funds

The money goes to the places on your plan through the people who do the work: canopy planted and watered on the hottest ward, a marsh edge restored where the surge comes in, a floodplain pocket kept open, a creek buffer planted, a lot depaved so it drinks rain. Your plan and your screening choose the places; the deployment gives each one an account and a line a payor can fund. For a worked heat example, read [who pays for heat resilience by the parcel](/guide/who-pays-for-heat-resilience-by-the-parcel?from=guide).

## the unit

| reader | unit | what it means |
|---|---|---|
| The city or region | One deployment | One scoped engagement at a number inside the public range |
| The project | One account per listed project | Money arrives in the project's name |
| The payor | One certificate line per project, counted in the payor's own unit | A dated record of named work at a named place |

The payor's unit is the one it already counts. As examples: an insurer **per policy in the area the project protects**, a power utility **per peak hour**, a large employer **a reportable partnership line**, a hospital per bed-day only if the hospital supplies that measure. We do not put a price on a unit; the payor and the city agree it.

## what happens after: build it in public

This series is the first rung. The next three happen per city, each only on your city's word (minting also after our review), and each in public on the city's group page and in a post:

1. **Real instruments and people.** The group minted, the first project accounts and certificate lines, a named steward and a first payor in conversation.
2. **The ground.** Candidate places found and shortlisted with reasons. The logic is public; owners' names are not, without their permission.
3. **Underwriting.** Each place valued, given its MRV clause and its steward on the split, and funded in the payor's unit.

A market on ensurance sits beside every other one in the protocol. Cross-city syndicates such as [urban heat](/urban-heat.syndicate?from=guide) and [coastal resilience](/coastal-resilience.syndicate?from=guide) already carry a risk across cities. The links are live; the depth between markets is still early.

## what it is not

A certificate is not an insurance policy, a catastrophe bond, an offset, an adaptation or resilience credit under any standard, or an investment. It does not replace a resilience bond or a green bond; [a resilience bond is still a bond](/guide/a-resilience-bond-is-still-a-bond?from=guide), and a market can sit beside one. Any avoided loss is the payor's to measure; we never promise a premium cut or a reduced claim.

Ensurance is a public ledger and a service; nothing here is investment, tax, legal, accounting or insurance advice, and the city stays accountable for its own procurement and its own claims.

## where we are

As of 4 November 2026 there are 25 groups on ensurance, including the city groups `.mumbai` (22 agents), `.boulder` (33), `.tokyo` (7) and `.la` (2), and 9 natural assets with a RealValue valuation. We have not set up a resilience marketplace for any C40 city, covenant signatory or region; this is offered. Who owns what we produce (the valuation, the records, the reports) is agreed at scoping.

## frequently asked questions

### how does a resilience marketplace help with city climate adaptation funding?

It gives the plan a way for payors to fund named work before the damage, in a unit they already count, beside grants and bonds. Whether a payor does so is its decision. The city lists the named work at named places from its plan.

### what does it cost?

An ensurance deployment is $15,000–$50,000 and the program $1,000–$4,000 a month for 12–24 months, each by the size of the town or region, plus the premium flow from the certificates, set out at scoping. A front end in your brand is scoped at contact.

### will our insurers lower premiums?

We cannot promise that. A certificate records funded work; any change in premiums or claims is the insurer's call, on its own measures.

### can covenant towns use this without a city office?

Yes, through a regional body that could run one market for several towns. Each town lists its own places and keeps its say.

### who owns the group and the data?

Your city runs the group. Who holds the owner key, and who owns the valuation and reports, is agreed at scoping.

## next steps

Pick the first three to five places from your plan, then [tell us the city and those places](/contact?from=guide&topic=city-resilience-marketplace). See the ranges on [our services page](/services?from=guide#finance). Cities can start from [the governments page](/solutions/governments?from=guide&topic=city-resilience-marketplace), regional bodies from [the regional collaboratives page](/solutions/regional-collaboratives?from=guide&topic=city-resilience-marketplace), and insurers that carry a city's book from [the insurers page](/solutions/insurers?from=guide&topic=city-resilience-marketplace).

## sources

- [Our services page](/services?from=guide#finance): the deployment, program and regional analysis rows with public ranges
- [FEMA, Economic Benefit Values for Green Infrastructure](https://www.fema.gov/sites/default/files/documents/fema_bca_economic-values-green-infrastructure_2025.pdf): the per-tree values, Appendix B
- [DC Department of Energy and Environment, Stormwater Retention Credit trading](https://doee.dc.gov/src) and [the price lock program FAQ](https://doee.dc.gov/service/faq-src-price-lock-program): the credit, the ceiling and the floor
- [C40 Cities](https://www.c40.org/) and [the Global Covenant of Mayors](https://www.globalcovenantofmayors.org/): the networks and their members
- [The Mumbai group](/groups/mumbai?from=guide): a live group page and its accounts

## the series

1. [how a city runs its own adaptation and resilience marketplace](/guide/how-a-city-runs-its-own-resilience-marketplace?from=guide)
2. [what an adaptation marketplace lists](/guide/what-an-adaptation-marketplace-lists?from=guide)
3. [who pays into a city's resilience market](/guide/who-pays-into-a-city-resilience-market?from=guide)
4. [your city runs the market. the protocol is the rails](/guide/your-city-runs-the-market-the-protocol-is-the-rails?from=guide)
5. [a town joins its region's resilience market](/guide/a-town-joins-its-regions-resilience-market?from=guide)
6. **launch your city's resilience marketplace** (you are here)