OR&R’s Disaster Preparedness Program Invests in Innovative Preparedness Valuation Research
April 19, 2021 — As part of the Disaster Preparedness Program’s (DPP) commitment to continuously enhancing the value of program services to NOAA and partners across the country, DPP has embarked on an innovative research collaboration exploring strategies to quantify relationships between disaster preparedness activities and outcome metrics.
Dr. Qing Miao (Rochester Institute of Technology) and Dr. Meri Davlasheridze (Texas A&M University at Galveston) will be working over the next nine months to examine the effect of government spending on preparedness and mitigation projects on the flood- and storm-related losses across U.S. coastal communities. The empirical estimates will be used to gauge the economic value of dollars spent on preparedness by quantifying and discounting future disaster damages they would save.
This research is being supported with a grant from NOAA partner the Coastal Response Research Center (University of New Hampshire) and an advisory committee of DPP staff and economists from the Office of Response and Restoration’s Assessment and Restoration Division. Study results will serve as a catalyst for further dialogue and exploration at a Value of Preparedness summit that DPP intends to host in 2022.
For more information, please contact Autumn.Lotze@noaa.gov.