EurekAlert: Researchers have developed a new way to model seismic risk, which they hope will better inform disaster risk reduction planning in earthquake-prone areas.
The study, which is published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences today (Monday 24 September 2018), and was led by academics from Durham University’s Department of Geography, has developed a methodology that assesses seismic risk by looking at multiple earthquake
scenarios and identifying impacts that are common to multiple scenarios.
This approach, which the team calls ‘ensemble modelling’, allows the researchers to estimate whether particular impacts are specific to certain earthquakes, or occur irrespective of the location or magnitude of an earthquake.
The team hopes that this method will provide contingency planners with a more complete picture of earthquake risk and potentially help guide the use of limited resources available for earthquake risk reduction.
The ensemble modelling method is novel as it goes beyond the standard probabilistic (identifying all possible earthquake scenarios at a given site) and deterministic (worst-case-event) approaches, focusing instead on the impacts of multiple possible earthquake scenarios.
Dr Tom Robinson, Durham University Department of Geography, said: “Earthquakes remain one of the deadliest natural hazards in the world and are a significant planning challenge for governments and aid agencies.