Default risk-based probabilistic decision model for risk management and control

This study describes how risk-based risk control allocation models work. We begin by discussing the economic rationale for allocating risk control in a diversified organization such as an enterprise. For a probability model for risk control decision making under uncertainty and risk, we propose a model involving stochastic total loss amount constraints with respect to various tolerable default levels. Our main objective is to develop a method that will allow shaping of the risk associated with risk control outcomes. The direct and indirect losses caused by simulated disasters can be estimated using an engineering and financial analysis model. Based on this model, we can generate an exceeding probability curve and then calculate how much of the loss can be eliminated or transferred to other entities should funds be allocated to risk control. The optimal natural disaster risk control arrangement with a probabilistic formulation is explained in this paper. Results from the proposed formulations are compared in case studies. The model attempts to apply risk-based budget guidelines to risk reduction measurement within a portfolio-based risk framework.     

Risk and uncertainty analysis in the planning stages of a risk decision-making process

Natural disaster risk, a long-time concern in the insurance industry, is increasingly recognized as a present danger in the business strategies of risk control and enterprise management agencies. Floods and earthquakes can cause massive loss of life and infrastructure, resulting in business interruption and heavy casualties. Many of the short-term developmental strategies employed throughout the world have only served to exacerbate the impact of natural disasters. Therefore, this study presents a review of formal methods that are commonly used in risk and uncertainty analysis in planning and concludes with a critical assessment of the advantages and disadvantages of the different priority setting methods. Our focus is a preliminary proposal for developing an efficient probabilistic approach to facilitate design optimization that involves probabilistic constraints.     

青藏高原多灾种自然灾害综合风险管理

青藏高原是中国自然灾害多发、频发重点区域,区内地震、滑坡泥石流、冰湖溃决、雪灾等灾种广泛发育,其灾害分布较广,灾损及其影响巨大,已成为高原经济社会可持续、健康发展的一个重要制约因素。高原自然灾害风险等级具有明显的空间异质性。整体上,地震、滑坡泥石流、冰湖溃决灾害高危区位于高原南部和东部边缘大片区域,该区域也是高原多灾种频发地带,许多路网和管网均处于该频发地段,其潜在危害巨大。青藏高原地形地貌复杂、气候变化空间异质性较强、冰冻圈发育,交通等基础设施广布,经济条件较差,这些因素形成了多灾种自然灾害发育的主要致灾因子和孕灾环境。高原受多致灾因子共同影响,各灾种承灾体多有重叠之处,亟须加强多灾种自然灾害综合管控研究。综合风险管控主导思路是决策者利用多灾种成灾机理研究结果,通过工程和非工程措施,以及各部门联防联控理念,全过程防范、减缓或规避自然灾害综合风险。具体综合风险管控策略如实时监测/观测、信息共享、部委会商、群测群防、防灾教育培训、保险承担、灾前规划。     

泥石流危险性分区及其在泥石流减灾中的应用

泥石流是一种突发性山地灾害,至今尚缺乏准确有效的预报方法。减灾工程也只能对一定规模的泥石流起到防御作用。泥石流危险性分区在泥石流减灾中具有重要作用。以泥石流运动数值模拟为基础,以数值模拟获得的流速和流深等参量为分区指标的危险性分区是泥石流危险性分区研究的重点和发展方向。其中,泥石流危险性动量和动能分区充分反映了泥石流的破坏能力,可以提供更为精确的定量化的分区结果。该类分区方法在城镇等有重要危害对象的泥石流减灾中具有广泛的应用。不仅可以应用于泥石流危险区和安全区的划定、泥石流灾害预估、泥石流临灾预案制定、泥石流抢险救灾方案制定和泥石流灾情评估等,还可以应用到山区土地利用规划、山区城镇建设规划和财产保险评估等领域,并起到防灾和减灾的作用。     

自然灾害风险初议

自然灾害风险的研究与评价是制定减灾对策、土地利用规划、社会发展与经济建设规划及保险展业的基础工作。自然灾害风险是灾害科学的前沿性研究课题。本文对自然灾害风险的特点、分类、形成原因、构成要素、结构层次、分析方法和研究风险的基本步骤进行了初步的讨论,以期在推动我国自然灾害风险研究中起到抛砖引玉的作用。     

A new viewpoint of hazard assessment and management for Taiwan��s insurance issues

High rates of urbanization, environmental degradation, and industrial development in disaster-prone areas have all served to increase the extent of damage following catastrophes. Recently, losses from environmental hazards have escalated, which has resulted in a noticeable change in policy, with more emphasis on loss reduction through mitigation, preparedness, and recovery programs. This study focuses on natural disaster management in which the direct risks are posed by the natural disasters themselves. This paper presents a review of issues surrounding natural disaster risk control and insurance in Taiwan. It proposes the use of background information concerning risk control strategies as well as earthquake, typhoon, and flood insurance in Taiwan. Finally, an insurance case study is utilized to demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed methodology.     

区域自然灾害风险分析研究进展

讨论了区域自然灾害风险的含义,指出了保险与灾害研究中对风险含义的不同理解,着重说明可能性风险概念,综述了区域灾害风险分析的内容及区域灾害风险估算的数学模型,指出风险分析可归结为风险辨识,风险估算,风险评价三个环节,风险估算数学模型的演进可概括为极值风险模型,概率风险模型,可能性风险模型三个阶段,着重介绍区域自然灾害风险分析的可能性风险模型。     

Dynamic risk prediction based on discriminant analysis for maize drought disaster

This study presents a discriminant analysis-based method for prediction of agriculture drought disaster risk. We selected the Chaoyang city in the Northeast China as the study area. We employed multi-scale standard precipitation index (SPI) to reflect drought hazard. We used the yield losses to indicate the drought disaster risk, which was divided into no, low, or high drought risk. We used the multi-scale SPI and drought disaster risk as the input factors for the discriminant analysis-based risk prediction model. The results showed that the model’s prediction accuracy varied between 40 and 82.4 %. The accuracy of high drought disaster risk category was higher than low and no drought disaster risk category. The prediction accuracy of the milky maturity stage was highest. We use leave-one-out cross-validation method to validate the model’s accuracy. And the results showed that the model validation accuracy of high drought group could reach 70.6 % in milky maturity stage. This study showed discriminant analysis is an effective and operable method for disaster risk prediction. This model can provide timely information for decision makers to make effective measures for drought disaster management and to reduce the drought effects to yields at the minimum level.     

Correction to: Discrete dynamical Pareto optimization model in the risk portfolio for natural disaster insurance in China

Natural Hazards - The original article, Discrete dynamical Pareto optimization model in the risk portfolio for natural disaster insurance in China, in Natural Hazards (2018) 90: 445–460, was...     

昆明市东川区泥石流风险性评价研究

昆明市东川区是我国最著名的泥石流分布区。基于社会经济发展的需要,联系泥石流研究的相关理论成果,使用泥石流危险性评价模型,结合GIS软件对昆明市东川区泥石流进行危险性评价,得出了昆明市东川区各乡镇的泥石流危险度。易损性评价是泥石流灾害风险性评价的一部分,根据每个乡镇的经济、人口等指标结合国内有关易损性的理论,建立东川区的泥石流易损性评价模型,从而对东川区以各乡镇为单位进行了易损性评价,得出了各乡镇的易损度。有了易损度和风险度,利用联合国提出的自然灾害风险表达式两项相乘得出了东川区的风险度。最后,使用ARCGIS9.0的制图输出功能,对该区域的泥石流风险性进行了分区和制图,给出了昆明市东川区泥石流风险性评价图,使该地区的泥石流风险性评价有了新的以乡镇为单元的量化指标,更好的服务于当地防灾减灾和经济社会建设。     

Modeling the integrated roles of insurance and retrofit in managing natural disaster risk: a multi-stakeholder perspective

This paper introduces a new modeling framework to understand and improve regional natural disaster risk management in the USA, including the interactions among key stakeholders and between the two important risk management mechanisms of insurance and retrofit. The framework includes a stochastic programming optimization to represent insurer decisions, which interacts with a utility-based model of individual homeowners’ decisions to insure and/or retrofit. Reinsurer and government roles are represented as inputs, and the decision models are integrated with a detailed regional catastrophe loss estimation model. This modeling framework is applied to a full-scale, realistic case study for hurricane risk to residential buildings in Eastern North Carolina. Several alternative system configurations are considered that affect the incentives for adoption of alternative risk management methods. They include providing a government subsidy for insured homeowners to encourage retrofit, providing both a government subsidy and insurance rebate to reduce retrofit costs, and mandating insurance purchase with a cap on insurance premiums. For each configuration, outcomes are presented from the perspectives of all key stakeholders—primary insurer, homeowners (insured and uninsured, in high- and low-risk areas), reinsurers, and the government. Results suggest that it is possible to design policies in which all stakeholders can be better off simultaneously. Retrofit incentives for insured homeowners can be effective in linking and strengthening the benefits of retrofit and insurance. Mandatory insurance coupled with capped profit loading factors and possibly retrofit rebates from the insurer to the homeowner can also reduce overall system risk.     

Defining megathrust tsunami source scenarios for northernmost Cascadia

Natural Hazards - Disaster insurance is an effective way in reducing and sharing natural disaster risk. In this paper, a special risk management model based on the cooperative insurance among the...     

Integrated risk assessment of multi-hazards in China

Maps of population exposure, vulnerability and risk to natural hazards are useful tools for designing and implementing disaster risk mitigation programs in China. The ranking of provinces by relative risk to natural hazards would provide a metric for prioritizing risk management strategies. Using provinces as our study unit, from the perspectives of hazard exposure, susceptibility, coping capacity and adaptive capacity, this study first constructed China’s disaster risk index for five types of major natural hazards: earthquakes, floods, droughts, low temperatures/snow and gale/hail. Then, the relative risk level at the provincial scale in China was assessed. Finally, the hotspots with the highest hazard exposure, vulnerability and risk were identified. The results showed that high exposure was a significant risk driver in China, whereas high vulnerability, especially social vulnerability, amplified the risk levels. Similar to the population exposure to disasters, the relative risk levels in the southwestern, central and northeastern regions of China were significantly higher than those in the eastern, northern and western regions. The high-risk regions or hotspots of multi-hazards were concentrated in southern China (less-developed regions), while the low-risk regions were mainly distributed in the eastern coastal areas (well-developed regions). Furthermore, a nonlinear relationship existed between the disaster risk level and poverty incidence as well as per capita GDP, demonstrating that disaster losses in middle-income areas are likely to increase if economic policies are not modified to account for the rising disaster risk. These findings further indicated that research on disaster risk should focus not only on hazards and exposure but also on the vulnerability to natural disasters. Thus, reducing vulnerability and population exposure to natural hazards would be an effective measure in mitigating the disaster risk at hotspots in China.     

Economic risk maps of floods and earthquakes for European regions

Europe experiences different natural hazards and subsequent risks that have various effects on the development of its regions. The spatial significance of hazards can be expressed as an economic risk when combining hazard potential with vulnerability data. Two examples of European natural hazard maps on floods and earthquakes, as well as the resulting risk profiles of regions (combination of hazard potential and vulnerability) give a first impression on the spatial characters of hazards in Europe and their potential impact on further spatial development. The economic risk maps enable a view on the spatial dimension of the economic damage potential of flood and earthquakes, pointing out comparable situations across Europe with the aim to facilitate targeted responses and policies. The spatial character of a hazard is either defined by spatial effects that might occur in case of a disaster or by the possibility of spatial planning responses. The integration of the economic vulnerability of a region (regional GDP per capita, population density) leads to a classification of areas according to their economic risk or damage potential towards hazards. These synthetic risk profiles are presented as risk maps of European regions in administrative boundaries. Obtained information can be of interest for spatial planning and development strategies, e.g. economic risk profile of regions can influence the targets of investments and could thus be an important background for structural funding.     

Quantifying cascading effects triggered by disrupted transportation due to the Great 2008 Chinese Ice Storm: implications for disaster risk management

Cascading effects are usually one of the common ways through which relatively minor hazards can substantially impact society and economy; the failure of a single industrial sector or cluster of sectors can result in cascading effect on other interlinked sectors. This paper attempts to quantify this cascading effect triggered by disrupted transportation in Hunan province due to the Great 2008 Chinese Ice Storm and proposes operational risk management measures. The advantage of computable general equilibrium (CGE) model (reflecting indirect and induced effects and the nonlinearity of production block) makes it a promising model to simulate cascading effects and the contribution of risk management measures. A detail transportation system is constructed in the production part of standard CGE model. This study finds the following results: The economic loss of Hunan province is amplified by approximately 40 times by cascading effects during the 2 months following the disaster. Large-scale disasters induce more strong cascading effects than minor ones. Post-disaster system resilience effectively stops the spread of cascading effects. When the economic system resilience (e.g., improving the substitution between road transportation and other forms of transportation and efficiency of road transportation) is increased by 10 %, the economic losses induced by cascading effects can be reduced by approximately 60 %. Overall, improving post-disaster system resilience is a highly efficient and cheap measure to reduce the risk from cascading effects.     

Regional disaster risk evaluation of China based on the universal risk model

A comprehensive understanding and scientific evaluation of natural disasters risk is not only the basis of disaster prevention and mitigation, but also the urgent needs of the economic and social sustainable development. Disaster risk evaluation index system in accordance with Chinese reality was constructed, which contains 5 second-class indicators and 28 third-class indicators; moreover, the universal risk evaluation model was designed combined with nonlinear damage evaluation method; then, the disaster risk of China’s 31 provinces was evaluated, as well as the urban risk ranking and risk map of 31 provinces were presented. The evaluation results can make us see the urban risk situation clearly and intuitively, which helps the related department to clearly focus on their work, as well as provides theoretical guidance for the national and local disaster prevention and mitigation planning.     

Natural disaster management mechanisms for probabilistic earthquake loss

High rates of urbanization, environmental degradation, and industrial development have affected all nations worldwide, but in disaster-prone areas, the impact is even greater serving to increase the extent of damage from natural catastrophes. As a result of the global nature of environmental change, modern economies have had to adapt, and sustainability is an extremely important issue. Clearly, natural disasters will affect the competitiveness of an enterprise. This study focuses on natural disaster management in an area in which the direct risks are posed by the physical effects of natural disasters such as floods, droughts, tsunamis, and rising sea levels. On a local level, the potential impact of a disaster on a company and how much damage (loss) it causes to facilities and future business are of concern. Each company must make plans to mitigate predictable risk. Risk assessments must be completed in a timely manner. Disaster management is also very important to national policy. Natural disaster management mechanisms can include strategies for disaster prevention, early warning (prediction) systems, disaster mitigation, preparedness and response, and human resource development. Both governmental administration (public) and private organizations should participate in these programs. Participation of the local community is especially important for successful disaster mitigation, preparation for, and the implementations of such measures. Our focus in this study is a preliminary proposal for developing an efficient probabilistic approach to facilitate design optimization that involves probabilistic constraints.     

Natech risk and management: an assessment of the state of the art

The present state-of-the-art for natech risk and management is discussed. Examples of recent natechs include catastrophic oil spills associated with Hurricane Katrina and hazardous chemical releases in Europe during the heavy floods of 2002. Natechs create difficult challenges for emergency responders due to the geographical extent of the natural disaster, the likelihood of simultaneous releases, emergency personnel being preoccupied with response to the natural disaster, mitigation measures failing due to the effects of the natural disaster, and others. Recovery from natechs may be much more difficult than for “normal” chemical accidents, as the economic and social conditions of the industrial facility and the surrounding community may have been drastically altered by the natural disaster. Potential safeguards against natechs include adoption of stricter design criteria, chemical process safeguards, community land use planning, disaster mitigation and response planning, and sustainable industrial processes, but these safeguards are only sporadically applied. Ultimately, the public must engage in a comprehensive discussion of acceptable risks for natechs.

Fine assessment of tropical cyclone disasters based on GIS and SVM in Zhejiang Province, China

Tropical cyclones represent major natural disasters in low- and mid-latitude coastal areas. Effective assessment of tropical cyclone disasters provides a scientific reference for the formulation of tropical cyclone prevention and disaster-relief measures. Tropical cyclone disasters in Zhejiang Province are mainly studied based on GIS technology, by considering disaster-causing factors, disaster-affected bodies, the disaster-formative environment, and spatial distribution of disaster prevention and relief capacity. In light of an uncertain nonlinear relationship between assessment factors and disaster factors, we used support vector machines to establish a fine, quantitative assessment model. This model evaluates the following disaster indices: Disaster-affected population, direct economic loss, affected crop area, and number of damaged houses resulting from a tropical cyclone disaster in Zhejiang, with the county as basic assessment unit. Assessment of tropical cyclone No. 0908 shows that the developed assessment model is able to accurately evaluate the geographical distribution of losses caused by a tropical cyclone.