Assessing the impact of explosive eruptions of Fogo volcano (São Miguel, Azores) on the tourism economy

Abstract

Abstract. The Azores are an active volcanic region that offers exceptional conditions for nature-based tourism, one of the main axes of economic growth in the archipelago. A future volcanic eruption may have long-term consequences to this economic sector. Therefore, it is fundamental to assess its vulnerability to volcanic hazards in order to try to mitigate the associated risk. This study proposes a new approach to assessing the economic impact of explosive eruptions on the tourism sector. We considered two eruptive scenarios for Fogo volcano (São Miguel Island), the most probable (Volcanic Explosivity Index, VEI, 4 sub-Plinian eruption) and the worst-case (VEI 5 Plinian eruption), both producing tephra fallout and pyroclastic density currents. The results of numerical simulations were overlaid with tourism-related buildings and infrastructure of Vila Franca do Campo municipality to identify the elements at risk. The loss present value method was used to estimate the benefits generated by the accommodation units over 30 years for different economic scenarios. The assessment of the economic impact using 2018 indicators reveals that in a near-total-destruction scenario, the economic loss is approximately EUR 145 million (considering a 2 % discount rate). This approach can also be applied to other volcanic regions, geologic hazards and economic sectors.

Calibrating Carbonization Temperatures of Wood Fragments Embedded within Pyroclastic Density Currents through Raman Spectroscopy

“…The 4.6 ka Fogo A eruption started with a hydromagmatic phase that was followed by the development of a Plinian eruptive column (>20 km in height, [51]) with the emplacement of 4 m of fallout deposit. The partial collapses of the column first generated small-volume, valley confined PDCs, known as "pink and black intraplinian ignimbrites", and, in the final stage, the total collapse of the column led to the emplacement of a voluminous ignimbrite [21,45,52,53], known as "dark brown ignimbrite". Based on [45] the total bulk volume on land of pink, black and dark brown ignimbrite is 3.2 km 3 (0.24 km 3 , 0.07 km 3 and 2.9 km 3 respectively).…”

Eruption Style, Emplacement Dynamics and Geometry of Peralkaline Ignimbrites: Insights From the Lajes-Angra Ignimbrite Formation, Terceira Island, Azores

“…A future ignimbrite-forming eruption of Pico Alto volcano could strongly impact the island, with devastating and long-term socio-economic consequences for its 55,000 inhabitants (PORDATA, 2020) and for the entire Azores archipelago (Medeiros et al, 2021). An eruption with similar characteristics to the Lajes Ignimbrite-forming event would be a worst-case scenario in terms of hazard assessment for a small island such as Terceira (400 km 2 ).…”

Spatial Characteristics of Eu-Funded Tourism Investments in the Northern Great Plain Region (Hungary) in the 2014-2020 Budget Period

“…At the same time, tourism can also be regarded as a high-risk economic sector: natural (e.g. volcanic eruptions - Medeiros et al, 2021;earthquake -Huang and Min, 2002; the rise in temperature caused by global warming - Carrillo et al, 2022) and socio-political (e.g. epidemics - Ambaw et al, 2022;Choe et al, 2021;Fekete-Fábián and Jánosi, 2022;Imeri and Gil-Alana, 2022;Ozbay et al, 2022;political instability -Omer and Yeşiltaş, 2020;Sass, 2020;Shaari et al, 2022) events have a major impact on the situation of tourism operators and thus on the regions that rely on the sector.…”