History of the Environmental Seismic Intensity Scale ESI-07

Abstract

This brief note aims to describe the history, from its early original idea, of the new macroseismic scale: The Environmental Seismic Intensity Scale 2007 (ESI 2007). It can be used together with other existing scales or alone when needed for measuring the intensity of an earthquake on the basis of the primary and secondary effects of a seismic event on the natural environment. These effects could be the major sources of earthquake hazards, as recently proved. This note also aims to contribute to the understanding of processes that induced the researcher to develop an idea, to pursue it, and bring it to its end, first through the help of valuable Italian researchers and then through the constructive exchange of ideas with researchers of different cultural backgrounds operating almost everywhere in the world. This note is sponsored and approved by the International Union for Quaternary Research (INQUA), and the Environmental Seismic Intensity scale (ESI-07) was published in 2007 after a revision process of about eight years.

Catalogue of the Geological Effects of Earthquakes in Spain Based on the ESI-07 Macroseismic Scale: A New Database for Seismic Hazard Analysis

“…This is the case for the intensity values corresponding to the European Macroseismic Scale (EMS-98) [7] and the Mevdéved-Sponheuer-Karnik Scale (MSK-81) applied in previous Spanish catalogues [42]. As is known, the MSK and EMS scales are nearly equivalent, with the exception that EMS mainly considers building damage, with the exclusion of environmental damage and geological effects of earthquakes for intensity assessments, which is one of the causes for the development of the ESI-07 scale [2].…”

“…In spite of the existence of databases with information on earthquake environmental effects-like that developed by the Italian Geological Survey (ISPRA), which includes data on about 200 globally distributed earthquakes (http://193.206.192.211/wfd/eee_catalog/viewer.php) [53], or databases with paleoseismic and active faults information [2]-none of them proceed to a proper ESI-07-based classification and interpretation. In this way, as noted by Serva [2] after the devastating 2011 Japan earthquake-tsunami (Tohoku) the IAEA recommended to the members states to carefully consider secondary earthquake ground effects in order to envisage a more accurate definition of the seismic hazard (in terms of intensity) in zones with nuclear installations [47] and the ESI-07 scale was largely considered in the published recommendations [54]. Some very recent catalogues and on-line databases, like that developed by the "Italian National Geophysics and Volcanologic Survey (INGV)" [55], consider ground effects, but they are treated in a descriptive-informative way and are not used for true intensity assessments following the ESI-07 guidelines.…”

“…Recent evaluations of the geological and environmental effects of earthquakes (environmental earthquake effects (EEEs)) indicate that such effects can be certainly parameterized and used for relative intensity assessments [1,2]. The introduction of the geological analysis of earthquake effects is primarily based on the application of the Environmental Seismic Intensity Scale (ESI-07) developed by the INQUA Paleoseismology International Focus Group in 2007 [3].…”

The 1976 Guatemala Earthquake: ESI Scale and Probabilistic/Deterministic Seismic Hazard Analysis Approaches

“…The assessment of geological, hydrological, geomorphological, and vegetation features, once used only marginally to evaluate the seismic risk, plays a privileged and key role in the ESI scale approach. The ESI scale has also been applied to modern and paleo-earthquakes [24][25][26][27][28][29][30], providing significant input for a better evaluation of seismic hazards in different socio-economic contexts [31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39].…”

Landslides Triggered by the 2016 Mw 7.8 Pedernales, Ecuador Earthquake: Correlations with ESI-07 Intensity, Lithology, Slope and PGA-h

“…Among all earthquake-induced environmental effects (sensu [1,2]), landslides are the most widespread and surveyed along coastal areas, in intermontane basins and in hilly areas [1,[3][4][5][6][7][8][9]. Landslide susceptibility is related to lithologic and geomorphic characteristics including highly weathered loose soils, topographic conditions, local hydrogeological and geological setting (e.g., [3,10]).…”