Water-related disaster risk reduction (DRR) management in the United States: floods and storm surges

Water Policy ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 17 (S1) ◽  
pp. 58-88 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jerome Delli Priscoli ◽  
Eugene Stakhiv
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Water Resources ◽  
Risk Reduction ◽  
Disaster Risk Reduction ◽  
Flood Control ◽  
The United States ◽  
Disaster Risk ◽  
Federal State ◽  
Army Corps ◽  
The Us

Water resources planning and management has evolved in the United States through several distinct stages over the past two centuries, transitioning from a concern for inland waterways transportation to single purpose flood control and finally to multiple purpose large reservoirs. Disaster risk reduction (DRR) was always considered to be one of the main goals of these strategies. Reviewing history, this paper describes a US federal system that presents major challenges to coordinating water resources development and DRR, at both the watershed and metropolitan area scales. The paper reviews the performance of existing flood protection systems of three recent disasters. Federal, state and local responses to these major events have been mixed, as regulatory and management agencies with different evaluation frameworks and decision rules attempt to coordinate their respective responses. The cases revealed new vulnerabilities and weaknesses in the US DRR responses and planning, while contrasting the relative successes of long-term, strategic DRR planning and investments in the case of the Mississippi River and Tributaries (MR&T) system. The paper analyzes this history and recent cases primarily from the perspective of the US Army Corps of Engineers.

Special Issue on NIED Frontier Research on Science and Technology for Disaster Risk Reduction and Resilience 2020

2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (6) ◽  
pp. 675-675
Author(s):  
Haruo Hayashi ◽  
Ryohei Misumi
Keyword(s):  
Risk Reduction ◽  
Disaster Risk Reduction ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
The United States ◽  
Disaster Risk ◽  
Risk Information ◽  
Shaking Table ◽  
Scale Model ◽  
Special Issue

We are very pleased to publish the Special Issue on NIED Frontier Research on Science and Technology for Disaster Risk Reduction and Resilience 2020. There are nine papers in this issue. The first two papers concern hazard and risk information systems: Sano et al. constructed a real-time risk information map for flood and landslide disasters, and Hirashima et al. created an alert system for snow removal from rooftops. These systems are already in use on the NIED website. The next three papers are case studies of recent storm disasters in Japan and the United States: Cui et al. analyzed the time variation in the distribution of damage reports in the headquarters for heavy-rainfall disaster control in Fukuoka, Shakti et al. studied flood disasters caused by Typhoon Hagibis (2019), and Iizuka and Sakai conducted a meteorological analysis of Hurricane Harvey (2017). Regarding volcanic disasters, Tanada and Nakamura reported the results of an electromagnetic survey of Mt. Nasudake. This special issue also includes three papers on large-scale model experimentation: Danjo and Ishizawa studied the rainfall infiltration process using NIED’s Large-Scale Rainfall Simulator, Kawamata and Nakazawa conducted experiments concerning liquefaction, and Nakazawa et al. reported the results of experiments on seismic retrofits for road embankments. The experiments used E-Defense, the world’s largest three-dimensional shaking table. We hope this issue will provide useful information for all readers studying natural disasters.

scholarly journals United States – Continued Dumping and Subsidy Offset Act of 2000 (WT/DS217/AB/R: DSR 2003:I,375)

2006 ◽  
Vol 5 (S1) ◽  
pp. 52-86
Author(s):  
Henrik Horn ◽  
Petros C. Mavroidis
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Hong Kong ◽  
European Community ◽  
The United States ◽  
Third Parties ◽  
Federal State ◽  
Byrd Amendment ◽  
Appellate Body ◽  
The Us ◽  
Wto Appellate Body

On January 16, 2003, the WTO Appellate Body (AB) issued its report on the appeal by the United States (US) of the Panel decision in United States – Continued Dumping and Subsidy Offset Act of 2000. The report concerns the consistency of the United States Continued Dumping and Subsidy Offset Act of 2000 (the “CDSOA,” or the so-called Byrd Amendment) with several WTO provisions. This legislation requests the federal state to distribute proceeds from antidumping and countervailing duties to all US economic operators that have supported a request previously submitted to the ratione materiae competent US authority to investigate alleged dumping or subsidization. The appeal was directed against the Panel’s finding that the Byrd legislation was inconsistent with the US obligations under the WTO Antidumping Agreement (AD), and the Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures (SCM). A total of 11 complainants (Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, the European Community, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Mexico, and Thailand), and five additional third parties (Argentina, Costa Rica, Hong Kong (China), Israel, and Norway), evidence the interest among WTO Members in the issues at stake in the dispute.

scholarly journals Preparing for climate change: an evaluative framework for prioritizing adaptation measures in Nepal

1970 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 35-42 ◽  
Author(s):  
Asheshwor Man Shrestha
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Risk Reduction ◽  
Water Conservation ◽  
Disaster Risk Reduction ◽  
Power Plants ◽  
Flood Control ◽  
Disaster Risk ◽  
Control Measures ◽  
Scoring Matrix ◽  
Adaptation Options

Severe potential climate threats for Nepal are expected to impact water resource, agriculture, biodiversity and livelihood. While adaptation and mitigation are both valid policy options to tackle climate change, it is advantageous for developing countries to opt for adaptation. It is also desirable that the most feasible adaptation actions be applied to protect development investment from climate risks and to ensure maximum preparedness. Adaptation strategies consist of a set of measures that are highly effective, affordable, technically and socially feasible and contribute towards disaster risk reduction. An evaluative framework using scoring matrix is utilized to prioritize adaptation options. Adaptation options for threat areas identified for Nepal are analyzed based on literature in the context of Nepal as well as for Asia and for least developed countries (LDCs). The measures are evaluated across multiple categories like public/private costs, effectiveness, social/cultural feasibility, speed, support for mitigation and aid in disaster preparedness. Based on the scoring matrix evaluation, following measures appear most feasible: (1) water conservation and management; (2) investment in smaller hydro-power plants; (3) research/planting of climate resistant crops; (4) diversification of agriculture; (5) development of early warning system for disasters; and (6) flood control measures downstream. Due to financial and technical constraints, it is advantageous to opt for ‘no-regrets’ strategies which benefit even without climate change. These set of measures can be carried out at low costs to reap sure benefits and should be prioritized for execution through environmental policies especially climate policies. Key-words: Adaptation; climate change; climate policy; disaster risk reduction; Nepal. DOI: 10.3126/botor.v7i0.4371Botanica Orientalis – Journal of Plant Science (2010) 7: 35-42

scholarly journals A spatial database of wildfires in the United States, 1992-2011

2014 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. C. Short
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Program Analysis ◽  
The United States ◽  
Federal State ◽  
Record Keeping ◽  
The Us ◽  
Survey System ◽  
State And Local ◽  
Wildfire Planning ◽  
Data Elements

Abstract. The statistical analysis of wildfire activity is a critical component of national wildfire planning, operations, and research in the United States (US). However, there are multiple federal, state, and local entities with wildfire protection and reporting responsibilities in the US, and no single, unified system of wildfire record keeping exists. To conduct even the most rudimentary interagency analyses of wildfire numbers and area burned from the authoritative systems of record, one must harvest records from dozens of disparate databases with inconsistent information content. The onus is then on the user to check for and purge redundant records of the same fire (i.e., multijurisdictional incidents with responses reported by several agencies or departments) after pooling data from different sources. Here we describe our efforts to acquire, standardize, error-check, compile, scrub, and evaluate the completeness of US federal, state, and local wildfire records from 1992–2011 for the national, interagency Fire Program Analysis (FPA) application. The resulting FPA Fire-Occurrence Database (FPA FOD) includes nearly 1.6 million records from the 20 yr period, with values for at least the following core data elements: location, at least as precise as a Public Land Survey System section (2.6 km2 grid), discovery date, and final fire size. The FPA FOD is publicly available from the Research Data Archive of the US Department of Agriculture, Forest Service (doi:10.2737/RDS-2013-0009). While necessarily incomplete in some aspects, the database is intended to facilitate fairly high-resolution geospatial analysis of US wildfire activity over the past two decades, based on available information from the authoritative systems of record.

A Burning Problem: Social Dynamics of Disaster Risk Reduction through Wildfire Mitigation

2015 ◽  
Vol 74 (4) ◽  
pp. 329-340 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susan Charnley ◽  
Melissa R. Poe ◽  
Alan A. Ager ◽  
Thomas A. Spies ◽  
Emily K. Platt ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Risk Reduction ◽  
Disaster Risk Reduction ◽  
Social Dynamics ◽  
Natural Hazard ◽  
Fire Hazard ◽  
Disaster Risk ◽  
Hazard Reduction ◽  
Natural Hazard Mitigation ◽  
The Social

Disasters result from hazards affecting vulnerable people. Most disasters research by anthropologists focuses on vulnerability; this article focuses on natural hazards. We use the case of wildfire mitigation on United States Forest Service lands in the northwestern United States to examine social, political, and economic variables at multiple scales that influence fire hazard and risk reduction treatments and their effectiveness. Variables highlighted include policy direction to prioritize wildfire risk reduction in the wildland-urban interface, laws and policies that make treating fuels in some national forest land management allocations challenging, social and political constraints on using prescribed fire, agency budget and target pressures, and integrating fire hazard reduction into forest management projects having multiple objectives. These variables compromise the effectiveness of wildfire mitigation treatments. Understanding the social dynamics of natural hazard mitigation is important because they affect its outcomes, creating differential exposure to natural hazards—one component of social vulnerability. Interdisciplinary research to identify how the social dynamics of natural hazard mitigation influence hazard reduction outcomes can contribute to more informed and effective approaches to disaster risk reduction.

Managing Disaster-Related Health Risk: A Process for Prevention

2018 ◽  
Vol 33 (3) ◽  
pp. 326-334 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Keim
Keyword(s):  
Health Risk ◽  
International Development ◽  
Risk Reduction ◽  
Policy Development ◽  
Disaster Response ◽  
Disaster Risk Reduction ◽  
National Research Council ◽  
The United States ◽  
Disaster Risk ◽  
Washington Dc

AbstractIn 1994, the first World Conference on Natural Disaster Reduction held in Yokohama, Japan affirmed that “Disaster prevention, mitigation, and preparedness are better than disaster response in achieving the goals and objectives of the decade. Disaster response alone is not sufficient, as it yields only temporary results in a very high cost.” Since then, disaster risk reduction has become the mainstay for international development related to disasters.According to the National Research Council (Washington, DC USA), “Disaster research, which has focused historically on emergency response and recovery, is incomplete without the simultaneous study of the societal hazards and risks associated with disasters, which includes data on the vulnerability of people living in hazard prone areas.” Despite over 25 years of global policy development, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (Washington, DC USA) recently noted that, “while some disaster management and public health preparedness programming may be viewed as tangentially related, a multi-sectoral and inter-disciplinary national platform for coordination and policy guidance on involving disaster risk reduction in the United States does not exist.” Today, one of the world’s “seven targets in seven years” as agreed upon in the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction is to substantially reduce global mortality by 2030. Significant reductions in health risk (including mortality) have historically required a comprehensive approach for disease management that includes both a preventive and a curative approach. Disaster risk management has arisen as a primary means for the world’s populations to address disaster losses, including those related to health. Prevention has been proven as an effective approach for managing health risk. This report describes the role of disease prevention in managing health risk due to disasters.KeimM. Managing disaster-related health risk: a process for prevention. Prehosp Disaster Med. 2018;33(3):326-334.

A Mosaic of Land Tenure and Ownership Creates Challenges and Opportunities for Transboundary Conservation in the US-Mexico Borderlands

2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-10
Author(s):  
Miguel L. Villarreal ◽  
Sandra L. Haire ◽  
Juan Carlos Bravo ◽  
Laura M. Norman
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Land Tenure ◽  
The United States ◽  
Land Ownership ◽  
Collaborative Management ◽  
Federal State ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Mountain Ranges ◽  
The Us

In the Madrean Sky Islands of western North America, a mixture of public and private land ownership and tenure creates a complex situation for collaborative efforts in conservation. In this case study, we describe the current ownership and management structures in the US-Mexico borderlands where social, political, and economic conditions create extreme pressures on the environment and challenges for conservation. On the United States side of the border, sky island mountain ranges are almost entirely publicly owned and managed by federal, state, and tribal organizations that manage and monitor species, habitats, and disturbances including fire. In contrast, public lands are scarce in the adjacent mountain ranges of Mexico, rather, a unique system of private parcels and communal lands makes up most of Mexico’s Natural Protected Areas. Several of the Protected Area reserves in Mexico form a matrix that serves to connect scattered habitats for jaguars dispersing northward toward public and private reserves in the United States from their northernmost breeding areas in Mexico. Despite the administrative or jurisdictional boundaries superimposed upon the landscape, we identify two unifying management themes that encourage collaborative management of transboundary landscape processes and habitat connectivity: jaguar conservation and wildfire management. This case study promotes understanding of conservation challenges as they are perceived and managed in a diversity of settings across the US-Mexico borderlands. Ultimately, recognizing the unique and important contributions of people living and working under different systems of land ownership and tenure will open doors for partnerships in achieving common goals. Una versión en español de este artículo está disponible como descarga.

scholarly journals Mobile Alert and Warning in the United States and Japan: Confronting the Challenges of International Harmonization

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hamilton Bean ◽  
Ana Maria Cruz ◽  
Mika Shimizu ◽  
Keri K. Stephens ◽  
Matthew McGlone ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Mobile Device ◽  
Disaster Risk Reduction ◽  
The United States ◽  
Disaster Risk ◽  
Warning Systems ◽  
International Harmonization ◽  
Global Partnership ◽  
Expert Workshop ◽  
Global Stakeholders

AbstractA U.S.-Japan expert workshop on mobile alert and warning was held online 8–10 September 2021. Funded by the Japan Foundation’s Center for Global Partnership (CGP) and responding to the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030, the workshop compared U.S. and Japanese mobile alert and warning contexts, systems, policies, and messages to investigate possibilities for international harmonization of mobile device-based early warning. The workshop’s sessions revealed two interrelated issues that repeatedly surfaced among workshop participants: culture and policy. The workshop illuminated several possibilities and problems confronting U.S., Japanese, and global stakeholders as they develop, deploy, and seek to improve the effectiveness of mobile alert and warning systems and messages.

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