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Abstract As demand for electricity increases on an already strained electrical supply due to urbanization, population growth, and climate change, the likelihood of power outages will also increase. While researchers understand that the number of electrical grid disturbances is increasing, we do not adequately understand how increased power outages will affect a society that has become increasingly dependent on a reliable electric supply. This systematic review aims to understand how power outages have affected society, primarily through health impacts, and identify populations most vulnerable to power outages based on the conclusions from prior studies. Based on search parameters, 762 articles were initially identified, of which only 50 discussed the social impacts of power outages in North America. According to this literature, racial and ethnic minorities, especially Blacks or African Americans, those of lower socioeconomic status, children, older adults, and those living in rural areas experienced more significant impacts from previous power outages. Additionally, criminal activity increased during prolonged power outages with both pro-social and anti-social behaviors observed. Providing financial assistance or resources to replace spoiled goods can reduce crime. Future research on this topic must consider the financial effects of power outages, how power outage impacts seasonally vary, and the different durations of power outage impacts. 

Louisiana is one of the most hazard-prone states in the U.S., and many of its people are engaged directly or indirectly in agricultural activities that are impacted by an array of weather hazards. However, most hazard impact research on agriculture to date, for Louisiana and elsewhere, has focused on floods and hurricanes. This research develops a method of future crop loss risk assessment due to droughts, extreme low and high temperatures, hail, lightning, and tornadoes, using Louisiana as a case study. This approach improves future crop risk assessment by incorporating historical crop loss, historical and modeled future hazard intensity, cropland extent, population, consumer demand, cropping intensity, and technological development as predictors of future risk. The majority of crop activities occurred and will continue to occur in south-central and northeastern Louisiana along the river basins. Despite the fact that cropland is decreasing across most of the state, weather impacts to cropland are anticipated to increase substantially by 2050. Drought is by far the costliest among the six hazards, accounting for $56.1 million of $59.2 million (∼95%) in 2050-projected crop loss, followed by extreme cold ($1.4 million), extreme heat ($1.0 million), tornadoes ($0.4 million), hail ($0.2 million), and lightning ($0.05 million), respectively. These findings will assist decision-makers to minimize risk and enhance agricultural resilience to future weather hazards, thereby strengthening this economically-important industry in Louisiana and enhancing food security. 

Research on the societal costs of disaster-related US school closures has focused, and due to COVID-19 will likely continue to focus, on pandemics, with very limited research on closures from natural hazards. This is surprising given that school closures occur frequently to protect children, teachers, and staff pre-event as well as post-disaster to convert facilities into emergency shelters, etc. This study investigates the secondary effects from post-flooding, temporary school closures after the catastrophic 2015 flash flood in Richland County, South Carolina. Lost productivity from school closures was quantified using the Human Capital Method. Out of the 208 completed surveys, 75% of households had children that missed school. Post-stratifying survey results on race produced an average of $437 in lost productivity due to school closures and an overall $2175 in lost productivity due to flood-related impacts in general. Expressed in FEMA benefit-cost analysis terms, our study shows that schools have a standard value of $215 per household and per day for the unweighted sample ($180 for the race-weighted sample). Furthermore, households' disutility for a late start is almost as great as their disutility for a school closure. These exploratory findings suggest that unplanned school closures should be minimized, and community characteristics carefully considered to avoid unintended socioeconomic consequences. 

Background: Individuals affected by disasters are at risk for adverse mental health sequelae. Individuals living in the US Gulf Coast have experienced many recent major disasters, but few studies have explored the cumulative burden of experiencing multiple disasters on mental health. Objective: The objective of this study was to evaluate the relationship between disaster burden and mental health. Methods: We used data from 9278 Gulf Long-term Follow-up Study participants who completed questionnaires on perceived stress, anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in 2011-2013. We linked 2005-2010 county-level data from the Spatial Hazard Events and Losses Database for the United States, a database of loss-causing events, to participant's home address. Exposure measures included total count of loss events as well as severity quantified as property/crop losses per capita from all hazards. We used multilevel modeling to estimate odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) for each exposure-outcome relationship. Results: Total count of loss events was positively associated with perceived stress (ORQ4:1.40, 95% CI:1.21-1.61) and was inversely associated with PTSD (ORQ4:0.66, 95% CI:0.45-0.96). Total duration of exposure was also associated with stress (ORQ4:1.16, 95% CI:1.01-1.33) but not with other outcomes. Severity based on cumulative fatalities/injuries was associated with anxiety (ORQ4:1.31, 95% CI:1.05-1.63) and stress (ORQ4:1.34, 95% CI:1.15-1.57), and severity based on cumulative property/crop losses was associated with anxiety (ORQ4:1.42, 95% CI:1.12-1.81), depression (ORQ4:1.22, 95% CI:0.95-1.57) and PTSD (ORQ4:1.99, 95% CI:1.44-2.76). Keywords: PTSD; disasters; mental health; natural hazards. 

Maps synthesizing climate, biophysical and socioeconomic data have become part of the standard tool‐kit for communicating the risks of climate change to society. Vulnerability maps are used to direct attention to geographic areas where impacts on society are expected to be greatest and that may therefore require adaptation interventions. Under the Green Climate Fund and other bilateral climate adaptation funding mechanisms, donors are investing billions of dollars of adaptation funds, often with guidance from modeling results, visualized and communicated through maps and spatial decision support tools. This paper presents the results of a systematic review of 84 studies that map social vulnerability to climate impacts. These assessments are compiled by interdisciplinary teams of researchers, span many regions, range in scale from local to global, and vary in terms of frameworks, data, methods, and thematic foci. The goal is to identify common approaches to mapping, evaluate their strengths and limitations, and offer recommendations and future directions for the field. The systematic review finds some convergence around common frameworks developed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, frequent use of linear index aggregation, and common approaches to the selection and use of climate and socioeconomic data. Further, it identifies limitations such as a lack of future climate and socioeconomic projections in many studies, insufficient characterization of uncertainty, challenges in map validation, and insufficient engagement with policy audiences for those studies that purport to be policy relevant. Finally, it provides recommendations for addressing the identified shortcomings.

This article is categorized under:

Vulnerability and Adaptation to Climate Change > Values‐Based Approach to Vulnerability and Adaptation