Research briefs

Homes were destroyed last month in bushfires near Lancefield, Victoria, lives have been lost as fires continue to sweep through southern Western Australia. Alongside the devastating loss of life and properties, many properties potentially in the path of bushfires are inadequately insured...

Scientists have warned that the south-western coast of Taiwan is a potential tsunami zone. Professor Adam Switzer of Nanyang Technological University's Earth Observatory of Singapore warns that a similar event is likely to happen again, but the destruction caused will be much worse. 'It would endanger millions of lives and damage infrastructure located at the south of Taiwan'...

When it comes to victim compensation, Feldman and Fish write, 'transnational regulatory regimes for compensating victims of natural disasters are largely non-existent.' Individuals are usually not compensated for personal injuries or property losses. Many private insurance policies exclude types of disaster risk, and many individual underestimate the risk of natural disasters and tend to underinsure....

'Disasters touch the lives of millions of children every year, and children are especially vulnerable to their aftereffects,' said USC Professor David Schonfeld, lead author of the clinical report. 'As pediatricians, we are in an excellent position to detect and address a breadth of problems following a disaster, and to counsel families and communities on how to be prepared'...

New computer models that estimate the social and economic impacts of flooding help to protect communities from devastating floods and to reduce the economic losses associated with them. A new study published in Nature Climate Change, co-authored by JRC scientists, reviews how global flood risk models are being used in practice to reduce flood impacts around the world...

As momentum builds towards the negotiation of the SDG's and UN climate change summit, G7 countries have made a strong statement about the importance of climate security risks. An independent report commissioned by G7 foreign ministers analyzes the security and stability risks posed by climate change and offers concrete policy options for addressing them...

'The aim of our research was to understand people’s risk perception and risk behaviour,' says Lydia Pedoth, a researcher at the European Academy of Bozen/Bolzano (EURAC) who led the study. 'We also examined the role of local knowledge, community identity and social networks, and the relationship between the community and the risk management authorities.'...

According to the research by sustainability scientists Matthew Bartos and Mikhail Chester of Arizona State University, higher temperatures and increased intensity of droughts could compromise the electricity grid, while the number of people exposed to extremes of heat is likely to multiply at least fourfold, and perhaps more...