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Estimating Tropical Cyclone Damages Under Climate Change in the Southern Hemisphere Using Reported Damages

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Abstract

This paper estimates the damages from tropical cyclones (TCs) in the Southern Hemisphere under future climate change scenarios based on the historical TC records in Australia. From the best-track TC data, we examine the changes in frequency, intensity, and economic damage of the TCs that made landfall since 1970. From the detailed individual TC reports, damage estimates are constructed based on reported damages. We find that the TC frequency has significantly declined over time. The intensity, however, does not show a significant trend. Average damage per TC has declined significantly from 43 million AUD in the 1970s to 11 million in the 1990s. This paper finds that 1 % decrease in minimum central pressure leads to 32.7 % increase in economic damage, which is more than three times larger than that found in the US hurricane study with regards to maximum wind speeds. For future damage projections, characteristics of the 14,000 TCs generated under seven different AOGCM climate models are applied. All seven climate models predict a decrease in TC frequency in the Southern Hemisphere but intensity predictions vary. By the end of the twenty second century, changes in climate are expected to increase the TC damage under the MRI (\(+\)94 %), the MIROC (\(+\)73 %), and the CSIRO (\(+\)66 %) model due to increased intensity. However, TC damage is expected to fall under the GFDL (\(-\)92 %) and the CNRM (\(-\)85 %) model due to decreased intensity and frequency. Adaptation will be a key determinant of the future vulnerability to TCs in the Southern Hemisphere.

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Notes

  1. According to the BOM, the number of intense TCs (Category 4 and 5) shows no appreciable trend over the period (BOM 2011a).

    Table 1 Frequency, intensity, and damage of all landfalling cyclones since 1970
    Full size table

  2. The report on TC Tracy states that it caused several hundreds of millions of dollars in 1974 dollar (BOM 2011a). Excluding the number of lives lost (65) and the number of people seriously injured (145), a conservative estimate of 200 million in 1974 dollars (0.32 % of the GDP at the time) is used for the analysis. This is approximately the value of the total number of houses destroyed, i.e., 70 % of the total houses in Darwin according to the report.

  3. Total population of a town instead of population density is used as an explanatory variable since it is a better indicator of vulnerability by way of the number of houses destroyed or damaged.

  4. The State dummies capture such factors as different income levels across the States.

  5. The damage estimates are normalized to 2007 Australian dollars using the GDP deflator. Therefore, the analysis assumes the same rate of income growth in the future.

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Acknowledgments

I would like to express my gratitude to Robert Mendelsohn and Laura Bakkensen for the comments on various drafts and to Kerry Emanuel for the advice on future TC projections. An earlier version was presented at the 4th International Summit on Hurricanes and Climate Change held in Kos, Greece on June 15th, 2013. I am thankful to the participants’ comments and James Elsner in particular. This project was funded by the International Research Office at the University of Sydney.

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  1. Faculty of Agriculture and Environment, University of Sydney, Biomedical Bldg. (Rm 216), 1 Central Avenue, Eveleigh, NSW, 2015, Australia

    S. Niggol Seo

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Correspondence to S. Niggol Seo.

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Seo, S.N. Estimating Tropical Cyclone Damages Under Climate Change in the Southern Hemisphere Using Reported Damages. Environ Resource Econ 58, 473–490 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10640-013-9744-x

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