Natural Hazard Overview: Flooding

The National Centre for Resilience supported the Met Office and their partner organisations in the production of a set of Natural Hazard Overviews. This factsheet is one of the set commissioned to meet a requirement for Scotland-specific information on the types, scale, duration and impact of a range of natural hazards. It contains basic guidance on actions that can be taken to mitigate the impact of flooding. They include information previously produced by the Natural Hazards Partnership, adapted to a Scottish context and with the addition of case studies

Natural Hazard Overview: Wind

The National Centre for Resilience supported the Met Office and their partner organisations in the production of a set of Natural Hazard Overviews. This factsheet is one of the set commissioned to meet a requirement for Scotland-specific information on the types, scale, duration and impact of a range of natural hazards. It contains basic guidance on actions that can be taken to mitigate the impact of strong winds. The set of factsheets include information previously produced by the Natural Hazards Partnership, adapted to a Scottish context and with the addition of case studies

Natural Hazard Overview: Landslides

The National Centre for Resilience supported the Met Office and their partner organisations in the production of a set of Natural Hazard Overviews. This factsheet is one of the set commissioned to meet a requirement for Scotland-specific information on the types, scale, duration and impact of a range of natural hazards. It contains basic guidance on actions that can be taken to mitigate the impact of landslides. The set of factsheets include information previously produced by the Natural Hazards Partnership, adapted to a Scottish context and with the addition of case studies

The role of science in physical natural hazard assessment : report to the UK Government by the Natural Hazard Working Group

Following the tragic Asian tsunami on 26 December 2004, the Prime Minister asked the Government’s Chief Scientific Adviser, Sir David King, to convene a group of experts (the Natural Hazard Working Group) to advise on the mechanisms that could and should be established for the detection and early warning of global physical natural hazards. 2. The Group was asked to examine physical hazards which have high global or regional impact and for which an appropriate early warning system could be put in place. It was also asked to consider the global natural hazard frameworks currently in place and under development and their effectiveness in using scientific evidence; to consider whether there is an existing appropriate international body to pull together the international science community to advise governments on the systems that need to be put in place, and to advise on research needed to fill current gaps in knowledge. The Group was asked to make recommendations on whether a new body was needed, or whether other arrangements would be more effective

Charity hazard - A real hazard to natural disaster insurance

After the flooding in 2002 European governments provided billions of Euros of financial assistance to their citizens. Although there is no doubt that solidarity and some sort of assistance is reasonable, the question arises why these damages were not sufficiently insured. One explanation why individuals reject to obtain insurance cover against natural hazards is that they anticipate governmental and private aid. This problem became to be known as "charity hazard". The present paper gives an economic analysis of the institutional arrangements on the market for natural disaster insurances focusing on imperfections caused by governmental financial relief. It provides a theoretical explanation why charity hazard is a problem on the market for natural disaster insurances, in the way that it acts as an obstacle for the proper diffusion and therefore the establishment of natural hazard insurances. This paper provides a review of the scientific discussion on charity hazard, provides a theoretical analysis and points out the existing empirical problems regarding this issue.natural hazard insurance, market failure, governmental assistance

The Izmir City and Natural Hazard Risks

Turkey has many geological disadvantages such as sitting on top of active tectonic plate boundaries, and why having avalanche, flood, and landslide and drought prone areas. However, this natural structure is inevitable; the only way to survive in such a harsh geography is to be aware of importance of these natural events and to take political and physical measures. Natural hazards are generally forgotten shortly after a while. Many projects that are planned to mitigate future hazards are suspended soon after natural hazards happened. Instead of taking pre- disaster measures and precautions, only emergency measures for recovery and post- disaster aid to the victims of a calamity are applied. Izmir which is the third biggest city in Turkey survived as a big city throughout its history of 5000 years and has been frequently renovated under geopolitical and geological influences. Izmir has been greatly affected by some disasters such as earthquakes, fires, epidemics and etc. Thus many edifices that would reflect historical background of the city did not survive until today and present remains are generally few and known only by experts and the neighboring people (Towards Agenda 21 in Izmir, 1998). Population increases and its development pressures on rural areas are inevitable problems for Izmir. Urban housing supply could not meet the demand, the housing policies could not be integrated with that of urban land and the housing subsidies could not help to serve low-income groups. Natural environmental features of Izmir increase its natural hazard risks. Izmir has sloppy topography that surrounds the city shape. Further more, soil geology is unsuitable for to settle down in built up area. On the other hand natural hazard risks increase because of the spread of the illegal urban settlements and because of the feeble building types. The major aim of this research is to bring up the magnitude of natural hazard risks in Izmir built-up zone, not being taken into consideration adequately. Because the dimensions of the peril are not taken seriously enough, the natural hazard risks, which are commonly well known, are not considered important or they are being forgotten after some time passes. Within this research, the magnitude of natural hazard risks for Izmir is being presented in the scope of concrete and local researches over Izmir risky areas.

Soil and water bioengineering: practice and research needs for reconciling natural hazard control and ecological restoration

Soil and water bioengineering is a technology that encourages scientists and practitioners to combine their knowledge and skills in the management of ecosystems with a common goal to maximize benefits to both man and the natural environment. It involves techniques that use plants as living building materials, for: (i) natural hazard control (e.g., soil erosion, torrential floods and landslides) and (ii) ecological restoration or nature-based re-introduction of species on degraded lands, river embankments, and disturbed environments. For a bioengineering project to be successful, engineers are required to highlight all the potential benefits and ecosystem services by documenting the technical, ecological, economic and social values. The novel approaches used by bioengineers raise questions for researchers and necessitate innovation from practitioners to design bioengineering concepts and techniques. Our objective in this paper, therefore, is to highlight the practice and research needs in soil and water bioengineering for reconciling natural hazard control and ecological restoration. Firstly, we review the definition and development of bioengineering technology, while stressing issues concerning the design, implementation, and monitoring of bioengineering actions. Secondly, we highlight the need to reconcile natural hazard control and ecological restoration by posing novel practice and research questions

Adaptive management of the climate change problem: bridging the gap between research and public policy

There are important differences between adaptation to normal climate and adaptation to climate change. One scientific community is organized to address extreme probabilities in current distributions, and their disaster potential. Another scientific community addresses the longer-term changes in the climate system. There are important differences between natural hazard (extreme and unpredictable events) and disaster as natural hazard with disastrous economic and social consequences as a matter of enormous concern. Finally, disaster management means a forecast for the real disaster events and after these disasters occurred, a post disaster attitude is necessary to ameliorate the situation and to take measures for rapid recovery. In this paper the author tries to address the description, understanding and prediction of extreme events in the weather system and their impact across a range of natural and socio-economic phenomena. Other goals of the paper are to present the weather and climate characteristics, the statistics of extreme events and to evaluate their impact on economy. Thus one major task of the work is to address the management of natural disasters caused by weather: the management of event forecast, risk assessment for various regions, and disaster management after the event occur. At the intersection between Economics, Management and Science of Weather Processes, this interdisciplinary study will provide the reader with insight and tools to address contemporary climate and weather hazard management problems.weather disasters, natural hazard, human vulnerability, extreme events, statistics and impact, management of event forecast, regional risk assessment, post disaster management

The overprotective parent - Bureaucratic agencies and natural hazard management

Due to the public good character of protective measures against natural disasters events, their allocation is very often in the realm of bureaucratic and expert agencies. Based on the economic theory of bureaucracy the behaviour of a bureau providing the good "protection against natural hazards" is analysed. The existing model is extended by further institutional constraints accounting for societal control mechanisms. The main proposition is that the allocation of protective measures through natural-hazard-management-agencies does also result in cost and allocative inefficiencies, however, the amount of allocative inefficiencies is relatively higher as compared to a normal bureau. This is mainly due to the potential of blame-shifting from politicians to bureaucrats. The considerations made in this paper can help to design a more efficient institutional framework in societal natural hazard management.Theory of bureaucracy, natural hazards, blame

Customizing Reinsurance and Cat Bonds for Natural Hazard Risks

This paper has the following two objectives: to examine how reinsurance coupled with new financial instruments can expand coverage to those residing in areas subject to catastrophic losses from natural disasters, and to show how reinsurance and the catastrophe-linked financial instruments can be combined so that the price of protection can be lowered from its current level. To address these two questions we define the key stakeholders and their concerns with respect to catastrophic risks. We then construct a simple example to illustrate the relative advantages and disadvantages of catastrophe bonds and reinsurance in supporting a structure of payments contingent on certain events occurring (e.g. a severe flood in Poland or a major hurricane in Florida). On the basis of this comparison we suggest ways to combine these two instruments to expand coverage to those at risk and reduce the cost of protection. We suggest six principles for designing catastrophic risk transfer systems, and describe how they may be put into practice. The paper concludes by raising a set of questions for future research. The unexpectedly large insured losses from Hurricane Andrew in the Miami, Florida area in 1992 ($15.5 billion) and the Northridge earthquake in California in 1994 ($13.5 billion) has forced the insurance industry to reevaluate whether it can provide coverage to all property in hazard-prone areas against catastrophic losses in the future. New institutions have been created such as windstorm pools in Florida and the California Earthquake Authority (CEA) to supplement or replace traditional reinsurance. At the same time the capital markets have developed new financial instruments such as Act-of God bonds to provide protection against these large losses from natural disasters. To date, these new instruments have only made a small dent in the market for protection against the financial consequences of catastrophic events, although there is the expectation by many that they will play a larger role in the future. Our approach is to examine whether the private market can offer ways to provide financial backing to deal with these risks. More specifically, the private market can provide hedges against catastrophic risks through catastrophe-linked securities, traditional excess-of-loss reinsurance and certain customized reinsurance coverage schemes. This paper has the following two objectives: (1) to examine how reinsurance coupled with new financial instruments can expand coverage to those residing in areas subject to catastrophic losses from natural disasters, and (2) to show how reinsurance and the new financial instruments can be combined so that the price of protection can be lowered from its current level. To address these two questions we begin our analysis by defining the key stakeholders and their concerns with respect to catastrophic risks. We then construct a simple example to illustrate the relative advantages and disadvantages of catastrophe-linked securities and reinsurance in supporting a structure of payments contingent on certain events occurring (e.g. a severe flood in Poland or a major hurricane in Florida). On the basis of this comparison we suggest ways to combine these two instruments to expand coverage to those at risk and reduce the cost of protection. We suggest six principles for designing catastrophic risk transfer systems, and describe how they may be put into practice. The paper concludes by raising a set of questions for future research.