A GIS-based framework for high-level climate change risk assessment of critical infrastructure
The IPCC states that climate change unequivocally impacts on various aspects of the natural and built environment, including our vital critical infrastructure systems (transport, energy, water/wastewater and communications). It is thus essential for countries to gain an understanding of critical inf...
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Elsevier
2020-01-01
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| Series: | Climate Risk Management |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212096320300255 |
| _version_ | 1818406540890079232 |
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| author | Lara Hawchar Owen Naughton Paul Nolan Mark G. Stewart Paraic C. Ryan |
| author_facet | Lara Hawchar Owen Naughton Paul Nolan Mark G. Stewart Paraic C. Ryan |
| author_sort | Lara Hawchar |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | The IPCC states that climate change unequivocally impacts on various aspects of the natural and built environment, including our vital critical infrastructure systems (transport, energy, water/wastewater and communications). It is thus essential for countries to gain an understanding of critical infrastructure vulnerability to current and future climate-related threats, in order to develop effective climate adaptation strategies. The first requisite step towards implementing these strategies, before any detailed analysis can commence, is high-level vulnerability or risk assessments. The work in this paper is concerned with such high-level assessments, however the framework presented is GIS-based, facilitating modelling of geographical variability in both climate and asset vulnerability within a country. This permits the identification of potential climate change risk hotspots across a range of critical infrastructure sectors. The framework involves a number of distinct steps. Sectoral information matrices are developed to highlight the key relationships between the infrastructure and climate threats. This information is complemented with sectoral maps showing, on an asset-level, the potential geospatial impacts of climate change, facilitating initial quantification of the vulnerable portions of the infrastructure systems. Finally, the approach allows for development of multi-sectoral semi-quantitative risk ranking maps that account for the geographical proximities of various assets from different critical infrastructure sectors which are vulnerable to a specific climate threat. The framework is presented in the paper and applied as a case study in the context of Irish critical infrastructure. The case-study identified for instance, potentially substantial increases in fluvial flooding risk for Irish critical infrastructure, while the multi-sectoral risk ranking maps highlighted a number of Ireland’s urban and rural areas as climate change risk hotspots. These high-level insights are likely to be useful in informing more detailed assessment, and initiating important conversations relating to a region’s critical infrastructure cross-sectoral risk. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-14T09:13:34Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-2643181209a2424eafccc22f650ea887 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2212-0963 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-14T09:13:34Z |
| publishDate | 2020-01-01 |
| publisher | Elsevier |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Climate Risk Management |
| spelling | doaj.art-2643181209a2424eafccc22f650ea8872022-12-21T23:08:30ZengElsevierClimate Risk Management2212-09632020-01-0129100235A GIS-based framework for high-level climate change risk assessment of critical infrastructureLara Hawchar0Owen Naughton1Paul Nolan2Mark G. Stewart3Paraic C. Ryan4Discipline of Civil, Structural and Environmental Engineering, School of Engineering, University College Cork, IrelandDepartment of Built Environment, Institute of Technology Carlow, IrelandIrish Centre for High-End Computing (ICHEC), National University of Ireland Galway, Ireland; Research and Applications Division, Met Éireann, Dublin, IrelandCentre for Infrastructure Performance and Reliability, The University of Newcastle, New South Wales 2308, AustraliaDiscipline of Civil, Structural and Environmental Engineering, School of Engineering, University College Cork, Ireland; MaREI Centre, Environmental Research Institute, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland; Corresponding author at: Discipline of Civil, Structural and Environmental Engineering, University College Cork (UCC), College Road, Cork, Ireland.The IPCC states that climate change unequivocally impacts on various aspects of the natural and built environment, including our vital critical infrastructure systems (transport, energy, water/wastewater and communications). It is thus essential for countries to gain an understanding of critical infrastructure vulnerability to current and future climate-related threats, in order to develop effective climate adaptation strategies. The first requisite step towards implementing these strategies, before any detailed analysis can commence, is high-level vulnerability or risk assessments. The work in this paper is concerned with such high-level assessments, however the framework presented is GIS-based, facilitating modelling of geographical variability in both climate and asset vulnerability within a country. This permits the identification of potential climate change risk hotspots across a range of critical infrastructure sectors. The framework involves a number of distinct steps. Sectoral information matrices are developed to highlight the key relationships between the infrastructure and climate threats. This information is complemented with sectoral maps showing, on an asset-level, the potential geospatial impacts of climate change, facilitating initial quantification of the vulnerable portions of the infrastructure systems. Finally, the approach allows for development of multi-sectoral semi-quantitative risk ranking maps that account for the geographical proximities of various assets from different critical infrastructure sectors which are vulnerable to a specific climate threat. The framework is presented in the paper and applied as a case study in the context of Irish critical infrastructure. The case-study identified for instance, potentially substantial increases in fluvial flooding risk for Irish critical infrastructure, while the multi-sectoral risk ranking maps highlighted a number of Ireland’s urban and rural areas as climate change risk hotspots. These high-level insights are likely to be useful in informing more detailed assessment, and initiating important conversations relating to a region’s critical infrastructure cross-sectoral risk.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212096320300255Climate changeCritical infrastructureGeographic information systemGIS-based analysisRisk assessment |
| spellingShingle | Lara Hawchar Owen Naughton Paul Nolan Mark G. Stewart Paraic C. Ryan A GIS-based framework for high-level climate change risk assessment of critical infrastructure Climate Risk Management Climate change Critical infrastructure Geographic information system GIS-based analysis Risk assessment |
| title | A GIS-based framework for high-level climate change risk assessment of critical infrastructure |
| title_full | A GIS-based framework for high-level climate change risk assessment of critical infrastructure |
| title_fullStr | A GIS-based framework for high-level climate change risk assessment of critical infrastructure |
| title_full_unstemmed | A GIS-based framework for high-level climate change risk assessment of critical infrastructure |
| title_short | A GIS-based framework for high-level climate change risk assessment of critical infrastructure |
| title_sort | gis based framework for high level climate change risk assessment of critical infrastructure |
| topic | Climate change Critical infrastructure Geographic information system GIS-based analysis Risk assessment |
| url | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212096320300255 |
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