skip to main content
US FlagAn official website of the United States government
dot gov icon
Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.
https lock icon
Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( lock ) or https:// means you've safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Explore Research Products in the PAR
It may take a few hours for recently added research products to appear in PAR search results.


Title: Extreme Weather Events and the Performance of Critical Utility Infrastructures: A Case Study of Hurricane Harvey
Extreme weather events have significant economic and social impacts, disrupting essential public services like electricity, phone communication, and transportation. This study seeks to understand the performance and resilience of critical infrastructure systems in Houston, Texas, using Hurricane Harvey (2017) as a case study. We surveyed 500 Houston Metropolitan Statistical Area residents after Hurricane Harvey’s landfall about disruption experience in electricity, water, phone/cellphone, internet, public transportation, workplace, and grocery stores. Our household survey data revealed the proportion and duration of disruption in each system. Approximately 70% of respondents reported experiencing electricity outages, while half (51%) had no access to water for up to six days. Two-thirds of surveyed households lacked internet access, and 50% had their phone services disconnected. Additionally, around 71% of respondents were unable to commute to work, and 73% were unable to purchase groceries for their families during this period. We incorporated the household survey responses into the Dynamic Inoperability Input-Output Model (DIIM) to estimate inoperability and economic losses across interconnected sectors. The projected economic loss was estimated to be in the range of $6.7- $9.7 billion when sensitivity analysis is performed with respect to the number of working days. Understanding the resilience of each sector and the inherent interdependencies among them can provide beneficial insight to policymakers for disaster risk management, notably preparedness and recovery planning for future events.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
1832635 2122135
PAR ID:
10485036
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ;
Publisher / Repository:
Springer
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Economics of Disasters and Climate Change
ISSN:
2511-1280
Subject(s) / Keyword(s):
Resilience, Inoperability, Input-output model, Infrastructure, Utility disruption
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
More Like this
  1. (, Economics of disasters and climate change)
    Critical infrastructure and public utility systems are often severely damaged by natural disasters like hurricanes. Based on a framework of household disaster resilience, this paper focuses on the role of utility disruption on household-level recovery in the context of Hurricane Sandy. Using data collected through a two-stage household survey, it first confirms that the sample selection bias is not present, thus the responses can be estimated sequentially. Second, it quantitatively examines factors contributing to hurricane-induced property damages and household-level recovery. The finding suggests that respondents who suffered from a longer period of utility disruptions (e.g., electricity, water, gas, phone/cell phone, public transportation) are more likely to incur monetary losses and have more difficulty in recovering. Effective preparedness activities (e.g., installing window protections, having an electric generator) can have positive results in reducing adverse shocks. Respondents with past hurricane experiences and higher educational attainments are found to be more resilient compared to others. Finally, the paper discusses the implications of the findings on effective preparation and mitigation strategies for future disasters. 
    more » « less
  2. ; ; ; ; (, Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board)
    We analyzed data from a survey administered to 1,212 respondents living in superstorm Hurricane Sandy-affected areas. We estimated the effect of having experienced hurricane-induced disruptions to utility services, such as electricity, water, gas, phone service, and public transportation, on having an evacuation plan. Around 39% of respondents reported having an evacuation plan in case a hurricane affects their neighborhood this year. Respondents who had experienced disruptions to electricity supply had an approximately 11 percentage-point higher likelihood of having an evacuation plan than those who had experienced no such disruptions. Respondents who had experienced monetary losses from Hurricane Sandy had around a five percentage-point higher likelihood of having an evacuation plan compared with those who had not. Among control variables, prior evacuation, distance to the coastline, residence in a flood zone, concern about the impacts of future natural disaster events, had window protection, and household members being disabled, each had an association with residents’ future evacuation planning and hurricane preparedness. In light of these findings, we discuss the policy implications of our findings for improving disaster management in hurricane-prone areas. 
    more » « less
  3. ; ; ; ; (, Sustainability)
    null (Ed.)
    Hurricanes and extreme weather events can cause widespread damage and disruption to infrastructure services and consequently delay household and community recovery. A subset of data from a cross-sectional survey of 989 households in central and south Florida is used to examine the effects of Hurricane Irma on post-disaster recovery eight months after the landfall. Using logistic regression modeling, we find that physical damage to property, disruption of infrastructure services such as loss of electric power and cell phone/internet services and other factors (i.e., homeowner’s or renter’s insurance coverage, receiving disaster assistance and loss of income) are significant predictors of post-disaster recovery when controlling for age and race/ethnicity. 
    more » « less
  4. ; ; (, Risk Analysis)
    Abstract Critical infrastructures are ubiquitous and their interdependencies have become more complex leading to their uncertain behaviors in the aftermath of disasters. The article develops an integrated economic input–output model that incorporates household‐level survey data from Hurricane Sandy, which made its landfall in 2012. In this survey, 427 respondents who were living in the state of New Jersey during Hurricane Sandy were used in the study. The integration of their responses allowed us to show the probability and duration of various types of critical infrastructure failures due to a catastrophic hurricane event and estimate the economic losses across different sectors. The percentage of disruption and recovery period for various infrastructure systems were extracted from the survey, which were then utilized in the economic input–output model comprising of 71 economic sectors. Sectors were then ranked according to: (i) inoperability, the percentage in which a sector is disrupted relative to its ideal level, and (ii) economic loss, the monetary worth of business interruption caused by the disaster. With the combined infrastructure disruptions in the state of New Jersey, the model estimated an economic loss of $36 billion, which is consistent with published estimates. Results from this article can provide insights for future disaster preparedness and resilience planning. 
    more » « less
  5. ; ; ; ; ; ; (, IEEE)
    Perkins, Edward (Ed.)
    Household resilience to natural hazards is a critical issue facing society with the advent of climate change. In this work, we developed one of the first household natural hazard resilience geospatial models for Rwanda designed to understand household resilience at detailed spatial resolutions. We evaluated indicators within the model through empirical fieldwork using an easy-to-deploy survey on Android tablets. To the best of our knowledge, the work presented here is innovative as it is some of the first to use geospatial technology-based surveys to conduct household-level natural disaster resilience surveys in Rwanda. Select results presented in this paper indicated that household vulnerabilities and subsequent resilience generally matched existing district-level risk mapping of Rwanda. However, our work went beyond existing risk mapping to understand individual household perceptions of resilience. Respondents generally reported a mix of positive and negative drivers of household resilience. Security vis-à-vis natural disasters and economic situation was perceived as very insecure, healthcare and education were very secure, and utilities, food and water, and housing were generally perceived as insecure but not as insecure as economic situation and security to future disasters. There is much more that can be understood in terms of household resilience as it relates to many factors of household resiliency in our model including physical vulnerabilities, financial capacity, information access, technological capacity, and most importantly, resilience perceptions. 
    more » « less
  • Citation Formats
  • MLA
  • APA
  • Chicago
  • BibTeX
  • Save / Share this Record
  • Send to Email