Brewer's Seismic Design Category, explained

Under the seismic model IBC and ASCE 7 use for new construction, Brewer is Category B. Low seismic hazard. Code requires basic seismic detailing (bracing, connections) but no special structural system restrictions. That puts Brewer in the 64th percentile nationally for seismic hazard - higher than 64% of the 4,875 US cities USGS was checked against here.

Brewer by the numbers

The raw figures: peak ground acceleration 0.175g, short-period spectral response 0.292g, 1-second spectral response 0.076g. Among 20 Maine cities in this dataset, Brewer ranks 11 for seismic hazard, the 47th percentile within the state. About 9,629 people live in Brewer, Maine.

What a retrofit costs in Brewer

Outside California, no state-level retrofit grant equivalent to Brace + Bolt could be found for Maine. A typical retrofit still runs $5,000-$10,000 nationally, about $7,000 for a common single-family job.

Earthquake insurance for a Brewer home

Outside California, earthquake coverage is typically sold as an endorsement added to a standard homeowners policy, not a separate product - worth asking about directly when getting a home-insurance quote for a Brewer address.

More on how this number was built

The methodology guide covers exactly how USGS's public design-maps API produced Brewer's numbers. The guide to what a Seismic Design Category actually means covers why a category is never a substitute for an engineer's assessment of one specific house.