Geoinformation for Disaster and Risk Management - ISPRS

Population Estimation for
Megacities: Solving Disaster
Management Challenges Using
Remote Sensing, Web-GIS and
Advanced Technologies
1 2
Eike-Marie Nolte , Beverley J. Adams ,
1
3
Friedemann Wenzel , Walter Svekla
1 Center for Disaster Management and Risk Reduction
Technology, Geophysical Institute, Karlsruhe Institute of
Technology (KIT)
2 ImageCat Inc, Ashtead, Surrey, UK
3 ImageCat Inc., Long Beach, California, USA
TIntroduction and background
The 21st century is the Century of the City. More than
3 billion of the earth's inhabitants live within urban
settlements (UN, 2008), but by 2050, it is predicted
that 6 billion people 70 % of the world's population
- will reside in urban areas (UN, 2008). It is expected
that urban areas throughout the world will absorb
population growth over the next four decades, while
at the same time drawing in rural populations.
Comprehensive disaster management seeks to
reduce the devastating impacts of natural hazards,
through resilient activities undertaken throughout
the disaster management cycle; for example, from
pre-event risk modelling, to post-event mitigation
and emergency response. For casualty and loss
estimation, risk models require building and
infrastructure inventory data, demographic and
socio-economic data. In the case of post-event
response, information is needed on the extent and
severity of damage.
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