Current and Future Exposure of Infrastructure in the United States to Natural Hazards

Abstract

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Climate Extremes and Compound Hazards in a Warming World

“…Many regions around the world have also experienced a rising number of costly disastrous events (Fischer & Knutti 2015, Idier et al 2017, IPCC 2012, Wallemacq & House 2018. The observed increase in the impacts of extreme events directly reflects increases in exposure to natural hazards (i.e., due to population growth and development), vulnerability of existing infrastructure systems (IPCC 2012, Neumann et al 2015, Willis et al 2016, and climate change and variability (IPCC 2012).…”

“…In turn, heavier precipitation events exacerbate the risk of flooding, debris flows, and rainfall-triggered landslides (Gariano & Guzzetti 2016). Increased flood risk in coastal regions is further amplified by sea level rise (Buchanan et al 2017, Jongman et al 2012, Vitousek et al 2017, threatening the integrity of coastal infrastructure systems and assets (Hallegatte et al 2013, Neumann et al 2015, Willis et al 2016. Population and development projections show a continued trend of rapidly expanding urbanization, particularly in coastal zones, which increases both vulnerability and exposure to extremes (Hauer et al 2016, Neumann et al 2015.…”

Risky Development: Increasing Exposure to Natural Hazards in the United States

“…Given that unusual, very large events reside in the right tail of the frequency‐size distribution, we defined hazard hotspots as pixels where event probability or magnitude exceeded the 90th percentile of all unique values in CONUS. Hotpots therefore correspond to the most hazardous subregions of hazard zones used in exposure assessments (e.g., Willis et al., 2016 , and references therein). Historically, the most devastating natural disasters, such as the San Francisco earthquake (California; April 1906; ∼3,000 fatalities; ∼11 billion inflation‐adjusted 2019 USD loss), Galveston hurricane (Texas and Oklahoma; September 1900; 6,000–12,000 fatalities; ∼1 billion inflation‐adjusted 2019 USD), and the tri‐state tornado (Illianois, Indiana, and Missouri; March 1925; 629 fatalities; ∼2.3 billion inflation‐adjusted 2019 USD) occurred in these hazard hotspots.…”

“…One of the most significant barriers in national scale risk assessments is inadequate characterization of development patterns (Willis et al., 2016 ). The use of fine‐scale data on the built environment provides advances in risk assessment including (a) more accurate identification of exposed structures, (b) detailed information on the characteristics of the places where people live, work and recreate, and (c) assessment of the land development patterns leading to changes in exposure (e.g., expansion and densification).…”

Climate‐Induced Changes in the Risk of Hydrological Failure of Major Dams in California

“…The American Society of Civil Engineers' report card in 2017, however, estimated that the average age of dams in the United States is about 59 years with an overall score of "D," which suggests many dams are in a poor to fair state (American Society of Civil Engineers, 2017). Consequently, the original dam design does not reliably account for changes in potential exposure of these important infrastructure assets to flood hazards in the future (Willis et al, 2016). Therefore, their construction did not incorporate the current and possible future changes in the hydrological condition.…”