Citation

Brown C, McDonald G, Uma SR, Smith N, Sadashiva V, Buxton R, Grace E, Seville E, Daly M. Australas. J. Disaster Trauma Stud. 2019; 23(2): 65-75.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2019, Massey University, School of Psychology)

DOI

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PMID

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Abstract

Modelling the economic impact of an earthquake event provides a means to support decision-making for investment options to improve disaster preparedness. Quantification of economic impact requires a comprehensive understanding of how damage to physical assets such as buildings and infrastructure networks translates into disruption to, and impact on, communities and businesses. This paper describes how a scenario narrative was developed as an essential prerequisite for an ex-ante economic assessment of a Wellington Fault event in Aotearoa New Zealand. The approach begins with the development of a suite of infrastructure asset damage and restoration maps, which account for infrastructure interdependencies. This data is then translated, based on expert elicitation processes, into a range of post-earthquake behaviours including population displacement, business disruption and relocation, and tourism effects. Lastly, these behaviours are set up as inputs for a novel economic model that captures out-of-equilibrium dynamics and behavioural adaptation. This narrative, alongside the economic modelling component, has been used to support decision-making around regional infrastructure resilience investment.

Keywords: Disaster impact, socio-economic modelling, disaster recovery, Wellington Fault earthquake

Language: en