PROBABILISTIC-BASED HURRICANE RISK ASSESSMENT AND ...

AbstractStudies are suggesting that hurricane hazard patterns (e.g. intensity and frequency) maychange as a consequence of the changing global climate. As hurricane patterns change, itcan be expected that hurricane damage risks and costs may change as a result. Thisindicates the necessity to develop hurricane risk assessment models that are capable ofaccounting for changing hurricane hazard patterns, and develop hurricane mitigation andclimatic adaptation strategies. This thesis proposes a comprehensive hurricane riskassessment and mitigation strategies that account for a changing global climate and thathas the ability of being adapted to various types of infrastructure including residentialbuildings and power distribution poles.The framework includes hurricane wind field models, hurricane surge height models andhurricane vulnerability models to estimate damage risks due to hurricane wind speed,hurricane frequency, and hurricane-induced storm surge and accounts for the timedependantproperties of these parameters as a result of climate change. The researchthen implements median insured house values, discount rates, housing inventory, etc. toestimate hurricane damage costs to residential construction. The framework was alsoadapted to timber distribution poles to assess the impacts climate change may have ontimber distribution pole failure. This research finds that climate change may have asignificant impact on the hurricane damage risks and damage costs of residentialconstruction and timber distribution poles.In an effort to reduce damage costs, this research develops mitigation/adaptationstrategies for residential construction and timber distribution poles. The costeffectivenessof these adaptation/mitigation strategies are evaluated through the use of aLife-Cycle Cost (LCC) analysis. In addition, a scenario-based analysis of mitigationstrategies for timber distribution poles is included. For both residential construction andtimber distribution poles, adaptation/mitigation measures were found to reduce damagecosts.xx