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Improved Short Term Hurricane Forecasts Save Money There is a research paper out this year about how much money is saved by having accurate hurricane forecasts. Forecast Accuracy Matters for Hurricane Damage, written by Andrew B. Martinez 1Office of Macroeconomic Analysis, US Department of the Treasury, Washington, DC 20220, USA 2Research Program on Forecasting, The George Washington University, Washington, DC 20052, USA 3Climate Econometrics, Nuffield College, Oxford OX1 1NF, UK Econometrics 2020, 8(2), 18; https://doi.org/10.3390/econometrics8020018 Received: 17 February 2020 / Revised: 6 May 2020 / Accepted: 6 May 2020 / Published: 14 May 2020 The methodology of this paper uses the 12 hour forecast error. Numerous studies show that humans tend to wait til the 11th hour to take an action such as evacuation of one's home. The study time begins in 1955 as 12hr forecasts are available back til then. The formulas are quite involved and can be viewed at the link above. It shows that better forecasts lead to better prepping and reduced damages, enough so to justify the amount spent since 1970 on improving hurricane forecasts. The conclusion is "cumulative reduction in damage from forecast improvements since 1970 is about $82 billion, which exceeds the U.S. government’s spending on the forecasts and private willingness to pay for them." Figure 1 Atlantic Basin Tropical Storm Forecast Error Densities 1955–2019. Notes: Densities are estimated using all 12-h forecast errors for all storms in the Atlantic Basin over the previous five years. There are about 100–2000 observations per density. The dark orange shading represents the 67th percentile and above for each density. Figure 2. 12-Hour-Ahead Hurricane Landfall Errors. Notes: Landfall errors are computed such that the forecast was made roughly 12 h before landfall. In panel A, the coloring is based on the angle of the forecast error. This is calculated from the distance between the forecast and actual location (shown), the distance between the location 12 h prior and the current locations, and the distance between the previously location and the forecast. Green: < 90 degrees; Orange > 90 degrees and < 135 degrees; Red: >135 degrees. In panel B, the uncertainty radius corresponds to the distance that captures 2/3 of all forecast errors in the five years prior to the year in which the strike occurred. Note that it did take near 35yrs to begin to see any real payoff in hurricane forecast improvement investments and didn't occur until some real improvement were realized and several damaging hurricanes made landfall.. Figure 3. The cost and benefits of improving forecast accuracy since 1970. Notes: Calculated as the difference in damage predicted from the Robust Gets model using actual forecast errors vs. the average forecast error from 1955-1969. The confidence interval is computed using the delta method. Federal funding for hurricane research and operations is 7–33% of total meteorology-related funding following National Science Board (2007, footnote 47). Willingness to pay is the cumulative sum of population in counties struck by a hurricane since 1970 times the real value of $14.73 over time. Wuhan's Worst Year Ever Continues After 31 days of heavy rain in China the Three Gorges Dam is starting to show weakness. They have opened extra gates sending a torrent of water downstream into Wuhan. A 3.8 magnitude earthquake was registered above the dam today compounding fears of landslides. Jade Mine Landslide Kachin, Myanmar A grim new record was set for the most killed in a jade mine accident. At least 162 people were buried in this landslide caused by heavy rain. The majority killed were jade pickers that went through the tailings looking for small bits of jade. Local authorities had warned them not to go to the jade mine on Thursday from fear of the heavy rain's possible effects. Another miner was quoted that he was about to take a photo of the precarious waste mound that he felt was set to collapse when people began shouting "run, run!"
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