Natural Disaster and Resiliency Depends On Better Integration of Built, Natural Environments

Improving the world’s resiliency to severe weather and natural disasters depends on how well we integrate our built environment with our natural one, according to the findings of a report presented today on the economic, human and structural impact of natural catastrophic events over the past year.

Craig W. Tillman, President of WeatherPredict Consulting Inc., presented the report, “Impact 2011: Examining a Year of Catastrophes through the Lens of Resiliency,” at the 2011 Annual Meeting of the Federal Alliance for Safe Homes (FLASH) being held Oct. 26-28 at Disney’s Boardwalk Inn, Lake Buena Vista, FL.

“It’s often said that natural disasters are man-made – our fragilities are directly related to how well or unwell our built environment performs in critical times,” Tillman said. “This report provides a platform for recognizing common themes and, ultimately, a framework to understand how resilience can work to improve communities worldwide.”

In his presentation, Tillman provided his company’s expert view of recent earthquake and weather catastrophes; talked about how these events shape the approach society uses to manage catastrophic risk; and discussed how risk management approaches are evolving. He also described the opportunities available for collaboration with the science and engineering community.

“In the context of historical natural catastrophes, 2011 continues to be a particularly challenging year, with significantly high human loss and property destruction,” Tillman said. “The most devastating of these catastrophes include the earthquakes that struck Japan and New Zealand causing a tragic number of deaths and outsized financial losses.”

He said the earthquakes in Tôhoku, Japan, and Christchurch, New Zealand, showed that even in the developed world there are varying levels of resilience for our most at-risk communities. And he reminded attendees that “mitigation pays,” saying that an investment in stronger building codes is a small cost compared to the lives and property that could potentially be spared.

For a copy of the report, visit http://www.flash.org/download.php?id=216.

WeatherPredict is a U.S. affiliate of RenaissanceRe, a leading global property catastrophe reinsurance company. One of WeatherPredict’s primary roles is bringing intelligence to the risk managers dealing with natural catastrophes.

With the theme Disaster Safety: One Movement, Many Voices, the 2011 FLASH Annual Meeting convened more than 100 of the nation’s leading experts in disaster safety, property loss mitigation and weather outcomes.

In a variety of presentations, panel discussions and demonstrations, meeting attendees are hearing and seeing the latest in innovative disaster safety and mitigation products, programs and impacts natural and manmade disasters have had on the U.S. economy and population at large. Prominent speakers include academics, builders, educators, emergency managers, engineers, researchers and scientists.

About FLASH

Federal Alliance for Safe Homes® (FLASH), a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization, is the country’s leading consumer advocate for strengthening homes and safeguarding families from natural and manmade disasters. FLASH collaborates with more than 100 innovative and diverse partners that share its vision of making America a more disaster-resistant nation including: BASF, Federal Emergency Management Agency, Florida Division of Emergency Management, The Home Depot®, International Code Council, Kohler Power Systems, National Weather Service, RenaissanceRe, Simpson Strong-Tie®, State Farm®, USAA® and WeatherPredict Consulting Inc. In 2008, FLASH opened the interactive weather experience StormStruck: A Tale of Two Homes® in Lake Buena Vista, FL. Learn more about FLASH and gain access to its free consumer resources by visiting http://www.flash.org or calling (877) 221-SAFE (7233). Also, get timely safety tips to ensure that you and your family are always well protected from natural and manmade disasters by subscribing to the FLASH blog – Protect Your Home in a FLASH.

"GfK Purchasing Power Europe" Study Shows Rising Income Despite Economic Uncertainty

 




The recently updated "GfK Purchasing Power Europe 2011/2012" study reveals the regional distribution of the population's purchasing power in 42 European countries. Prospects for the disposable income available to Europe's households in 2011 continue to be optimistic despite the current debt crisis and economic slowdown in the second half of the year.

According to the results of the "GfK Purchasing Power Europe 2011/2012" study, European consumers have approximately €8,500 billion available for consumer purchases (e.g., retail, traveling) or saving in 2011. This corresponds to an average purchasing power of €12,774 per inhabitant for the 42 countries studied. Taking into account the upward adjusted 2010 numbers for many countries, a purchasing power growth rate of 3.1 percent is expected this year in the 42 countries under review.

However, a growth rate of only 2.3 percent is expected for the 15 long-standing EU member countries; the upward trend is mostly driven by the new member states and EU candidate countries or partner countries, particularly Turkey and the Ukraine, whose high number of inhabitants and high growth boost the growth rate for all of Europe.

Regional purchasing power distribution in selected countries

Norway: Prosperity apparent in purchasing power level

With a 2011 per capita purchasing power of €29,028, Norway comes in third in the purchasing power rankings behind Liechtenstein and Switzerland. The just under 5 million inhabitants of Norway thus have more than twice as much purchasing power as the average among the 42 countries reviewed. Norway's high ranking is in part a reflection of an exchange rate-related phenomenon: The positive revaluation of the Norwegian krone against the euro contributes to the increase in purchasing power when this value is expressed in euros.

The wealthiest district in the country - Oslo - is also the most populated. The around 600,000 inhabitants of the capit

INTERGEO 2011 – Emerging Technologies the Driving Force Behind New Approaches and Applications

 After the three-day INTERGEO event in Nuremberg, one thing was clear: “INTERGEO is a platform for dialogue between technology users from a variety of sectors – dialogue that gives rise to new approaches and applications. The resultant scope of possible new uses is considerable,” stated Olaf Freier, Managing Director of HINTE GmbH and INTERGEO organiser. “There is quite simply no better specialist platform for suppliers and users to network than this leading international trade fair,” said Professor Karl-Friedrich Thöne, President of INTERGEO patron DVW e.V. – the German Society for Geodesy, Geoinformation and Land Management.
A representative survey of exhibitors highlighted the optimistic mood at INTERGEO. Just under 70 percent of exhibitors felt the innovation rate in the industry was higher, while 21 percent expected an equally strong impetus from innovations.
Some 16,000 trade visitors from 80 different countries attended the 17th INTERGEO to find out about new developments. The event was more international than ever, with more than one in four visitors travelling from abroad. Attracting 1,500 participants, the conference included 140 lectures and provided an opportunity for intensive interdisciplinary discussions on around 40 topics.
Collaboration with the SatNav Forum proved highly successful. For the first time, the BMVBS (German Federal Ministry of Transport, Building and Urban Development) and BITKOM (Federal Association for Information, Technology, Telecommunications and New Media) held the annual navigation conference in parallel with INTERGEO. “Never has there been such intensive dialogue between politicians and representatives from geoinformation technologies as at this year's INTERGEO. This provides clear proof of geoinformation's current and future significance in everyday life,” said DVW President Thöne. Discussions on further intensifying and continuing collaboration have already been agreed. On a tour of the three trade fair halls with a total exhibition area of 28,000 square metres, BMVBS State Secretary Rainer Bomba was impressed by the numerous solutions on offer from industry and service providers.
Exhibitors provided impressive confirmation of the event's success. Some 92 percent of participating companies, institutions and associations indicated that they had achieved their trade fair targets. Their top priorities were cultivating new and existing contacts and presenting innovations. More than 85 percent of exhibitors gave one of the top 3 ratings when evaluating the overall impression of INTERGEO. A high proportion of just under 89 percent indicated that they would be returning to the trade fair. And 16 percent of these companies spontaneously indicated that they would be increasing their level of participation. Exhibitors were united in their praise for the high quality of contacts they made.
Trade visitors – 98.7 percent according to the representative visitor survey – were happy to travel some way to the event. Thanks to intensive media networking worldwide and a high level of acceptance for INTERGEO's mobile concept, more than 53 percent travelled to Nuremberg from a distance of more than 300 kilometres. This is 13 percent higher than the figure for the previous year. The long journey proved worthwhile for first-time visitors, too. They accounted for 35 percent of total visitor numbers. Some 95 percent of visitors participating in the survey rated the range of products and services on offer positively. Their top priority was to find out about innovations, obtain a general overview of what was on offer, establish and cultivate contacts, and take a closer look at specific products.

“INTERGEO is one of Trimble's most important events,” said Chris Gibson, Vice President of the conference sponsor. One key factor that made INTERGEO so important for companies was the high proportion – a total of 75 percent – of people making or involved in making decisions among the trade public. Just under a third of visitors reported that they had placed orders at INTERGEO or had indicated at the fair that they would be doing so. Nearly 70 percent of the high proportion of decision-makers attending the event wait for INTERGEO before placing their orders.
The focus in 2011 was on geodata infrastructure, sensors and 3D mapping. Olaf Freier expects these topics to be joined by smartphones at INTERGEO 2012 in Hanover.

NASA, NOAA Data Show Significant Antarctic Ozone Hole Remains

 NASA, NOAA Data Show Significant Antarctic Ozone Hole

The Antarctic ozone hole, which yawns wide every Southern Hemisphere spring, reached its annual peak on Sept. 12. It stretched to 10.05 million square miles, the ninth largest ozone hole on record. Above the South Pole, the ozone hole reached its deepest point of the season on Oct. 9, tying this year for the 10th lowest in this 26-year record. 

NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) use balloon-borne instruments, ground-based instruments and satellites to monitor the annual Antarctic ozone hole, global levels of ozone in the stratosphere and the manmade chemicals that contribute to ozone depletion. 

"The colder than average temperatures in the stratosphere this year caused a larger than average ozone hole," said Paul Newman, chief scientist for atmospheres at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. "Even though it was relatively large, the area of this year's ozone hole was within the range we'd expect given the levels of manmade ozone-depleting chemicals that continue to persist in the atmosphere." 

The ozone layer helps protect the planet's surface from harmful ultraviolet radiation. Ozone depletion results in more incoming radiation that can hit the surface, elevating the risk of skin cancer and other harmful effects.

"The manmade chemicals known to destroy ozone are slowly declining because of international action, but there are still large amounts of these chemicals doing damage," said James Butler, director of NOAA's Global Monitoring Division in Boulder, Colo. 

In the Antarctic spring (August and September) the sun begins rising again after several months of darkness and polar-circling winds keep cold air trapped above the continent. Sunlight-sparked reactions involving ice clouds and manmade chemicals begin eating away at the ozone. Most years, the conditions for ozone depletion ease before early December when the seasonal hole closes. 

Levels of most ozone-depleting chemicals in the atmosphere have been gradually declining as the result of the 1987 Montreal Protocol, an international treaty to protect the ozone layer. That international treaty caused the phase-out of ozone-depleting chemicals, which had been used widely in refrigeration, as solvents and in aerosol spray cans. 

However, most of those chemicals remain in the atmosphere for decades.

Global atmospheric computer models predict that stratospheric ozone could recover by midcentury, but the ozone hole in the Antarctic will likely persist one to two decades longer, according to the latest analysis in the 2010 Quadrennial Ozone Assessment issued by the World Meteorological Organization and United Nations Environment Programme, with co-authors from NASA and NOAA. 

NASA currently measures ozone in the stratosphere with the Dutch-Finnish Ozone Monitoring Instrument, or OMI, on board the Aura satellite. OMI continues a NASA legacy of monitoring the ozone layer from space that dates back to 1972 with launch of the Nimbus-4 satellite. The instrument measured the 2011 ozone hole at its deepest at 95 Dobson units on Oct. 8 this year. This differs slightly from NOAA's balloon-borne ozone observations from the South Pole (102 Dobson units) because OMI measures ozone across the entire Antarctic region. 

That satellite-monitoring legacy will continue with the launch of NASA's National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System Preparatory Project, known as NPP, on Oct. 28. The satellite will carry a new ozone-monitoring instrument, the Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite. The instruments will provide more detailed daily, global ozone measurements than ever before to continue observing the ozone layer's gradual recovery. 

It will take a few years of averaging yearly lows in Antarctic ozone to discern evidence of recovery in ozone levels because seasonal cycles and other variable natural factors -- from the temperature of the atmosphere to the stability of atmospheric layers -- can make ozone levels dip and soar from day to day and year to year. 

NOAA has been tracking ozone depletion around the globe, including the South Pole, from several perspectives. NOAA researchers have used balloons to loft instruments 18 miles into the atmosphere for more than 24 years to collect detailed profiles of ozone levels from the surface up. NOAA also tracks ozone with ground-based instruments and from space. 

For the updates on the status of the Antarctic ozone layer, visit: http://ozonewatch.gsfc.nasa.gov

For more information on the Antarctic ozone hole, visit: http://www.ozonelayer.noaa.gov