The First Street Foundation, a nonprofit research and technology group that assesses the threat posed by flooding across the country, released a report that found one-forth of critical infrastructure in the USA is at risk of flooding including: police and fire stations, hospitals, airports and wastewater treatment facilities.
“With an increasing number of flooding 1events making U.S. headlines, there is a greater awareness of the economic and human cost that
flood-damaged infrastructure can produce. For instance, Hurricane Sandy flooded hospitals, crippled electrical substations, overwhelmed waste water treatment centers, and shut down power and water to tens of millions of people (U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, 2012). More recently, the impact of Hurricane Ida stretched across the country crippling the electrical grid in southern Louisiana, flooding the transportation infrastructure in the NYC metro area, and killing nearly 100 people. It is clear, now more than ever, that the ways and places in which we live are likely to continue to be impacted by our changing environment. One of the most important implications in this development is the vulnerability of our national infrastructure.”
About 1/4 (2 million miles) of roads are already at risk of becoming impassable due to flooding.
“And as global warming melts ice sheets, raises sea levels and tilts the odds in favor of more extreme rainfall events, the risk will grow in many more communities, the First Street report found. Over the next 30 years, the number of residential properties at risk of flooding is expected to grow from 12.4 million today to 13.6 million by 2051, the report says. For critical infrastructure and commercial properties, the number of vulnerable facilities are projected to grow by 6% and 7% respectively over the next three decades,” said Drew Kann and Ella Nilsen.
Infrastructure Flood Risk
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