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Urban stormwater management is a growing challenge in many U.S. cities. Continued population growth, urbanization, and inadequate investment in storm- and wastewater infrastructure have left many cities exposed to sewer overflows, stormwater flooding, and reduced water quality. Climate change is expected to add to this challenge by increasing the intensity or volume of rainfall from storms in many regions. There is also a growing acknowledgment that these vulnerabilities are environmental justice and equity challenges, as flooding and other negative outcomes disproportionately affect low-income or majority-minority neighborhoods. Pittsburgh's Negley Run watershed is a prime example of these stormwater management challenges, draining a diverse area of Pittsburgh's East End, including neighborhoods that have suffered heavily from underinvestment. It also represents an urgent flood-risk challenge in the city, as heavy rainfall in the area leads to regular flooding of a key road corridor. In this project, RAND researchers use simulation modeling to evaluate present and future risks in Negley Run from sewer overflows and flooding given future rainfall uncertainty. The authors then evaluate proposals for a phased series of green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) investments. In addition to estimating stormwater benefits and implementation costs, the authors provide economic estimates of recreational, amenity, and other cobenefits to local residents; compare total benefits to costs; and explore potential trade-offs. Results show that a centralized system of stormwater management in Negley Run could yield cost-effective sewer-overflow reduction, reduce street flooding, and provide positive net economic benefits across a range of assumptions about future rainfall and implementation costs.
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Water quality --- Water quality management --- Environmental Engineering --- Civil & Environmental Engineering --- Engineering & Applied Sciences --- Decision making --- Water quality control --- Freshwater --- Freshwater quality --- Marine water quality --- Quality of water --- Seawater --- Seawater quality --- Water --- Management --- Quality --- Sewage disposal --- Water conservation --- Water-supply --- Environmental quality --- Composition --- National Water Program (U.S.) --- United States.
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In view of uncertainties about the future threat environment, trajectories of technological development, and shifting budgeting priorities, RAND Project AIR FORCE examined analytical methods that would best guide the recently established Air Force Warfighting Integration Capability in capability development planning (CDP), as well as concept development and future force design. In their review, researchers found that specific methods of decisionmaking under deep uncertainty (DMDU) can provide the most suitable means for arriving at solutions that are flexible, adaptable, and robust and guiding investment pathways and modernization efforts. The method highlighted, Robust Decisionmaking, rests on a simple concept. Rather than using models and data to assess policies under a single set of assumptions, RDM runs models over hundreds to thousands of different sets of assumptions about the problem space with the aim of understanding how plans perform under many plausible conditions. Each of the four steps of RDM — decision-framing, case generation, vulnerability assessment and scenario discovery, and trade-off analysis — feeds into the next, providing stakeholders and decisionmakers with a more informed tradespace. By exposing vulnerabilities of different options under different scenarios, RDM can enable stakeholders to engage in a rich dialogue about which risks or vulnerabilities are acceptable, as well as to review assumptions made in framing the problem and make adjustments as needed.
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Natural disasters have become more frequent and destructive. In 2020, the United States experienced the most billion-dollar disasters ever, with a total cost of
Hazard mitigation --- Disaster relief --- Emergency management --- Natural disasters --- Social problems --- Government policy --- Planning. --- Prevention --- Evaluation. --- Government policy
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This report highlights RAND's contributions to the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority's Master Plan. Its purpose is to help policymakers in other coastal regions understand the value of a solid technical foundation to support decisionmaking on strategies to reduce flood risk, rebuild or restore coastal environments, and increase the resilience of developed coastal regions.
Coastal engineering -- United States -- Planning. --- Coastal zone management -- Louisiana. --- Planning -- Technique. --- Shore protection -- United States -- Planning. --- Coastal zone management --- Coastal engineering --- Shore protection --- Planning --- Sociology & Social History --- Social Sciences --- Communities - Urban Groups --- Technique --- Technique. --- Planning. --- Beach erosion --- Coast protection --- Coast protective works --- Prevention --- Hydraulic engineering --- Reclamation of land --- Engineering
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The U.S. Coast Guard's motto is Semper Paratus — always ready. But for what? The service carries out 11 diverse statutory missions and must address both immediate needs and future contingencies, which makes this question difficult to answer. Future changes to the operating environment in the physical, economic, social, political, and technological domains promise additional stresses on service resources, in addition to changing the makeup of the service itself. One way to aid decisionmaking in the face of a deeply uncertain future is by more effectively leveraging the Coast Guard's Evergreen strategic foresight initiative. Analysts from the Homeland Security Operational Analysis Center adapted an approach to developing future scenarios and, in this report, present example components of Coast Guard global planning scenarios related to future service readiness. These posture the Coast Guard to better integrate slow-burning issues and problems that might emerge only down the road into nearer-term decisions that can help prepare the service for upcoming challenges. Without weighing the long view of changes in the operating environment alongside current or nearer-term demands, the Coast Guard will not be able to have full awareness of what blind spots might exist in current strategies and plans. Being ready for the spectrum of challenges the future might bring requires mindfulness of both the near and long terms and how change will affect the Coast Guard.
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To establish an evidence-based foundation for the congressionally required short- and long-term recovery and resilience plan for Puerto Rico following the 2017 hurricanes, the Homeland Security Operational Analysis Center assessed the damage from the 2017 hurricane season and remaining needs across the commonwealth in collaboration with federal agencies, the government of Puerto Rico, and other stakeholders. The experts examined what happened during and after Hurricanes Irma and Maria but also how the effects of the hurricanes exacerbated and were exacerbated by predisaster challenges and stressors. This report provides a comprehensive summary of the commonwealth's challenges and status before and after the storms hit, including their effects on Puerto Rico's people and communities; economy; built and natural environments; and education, health, and social services. Before the hurricanes, Puerto Rico faced an economic crisis, a shrinking, aging population, substandard public education, poverty, poor housing stock, governance challenges, neglect of infrastructure and resources, and environmental degradation. Hurricane Maria's direct and devastating landfall on Puerto Rico in September 2017 only exacerbated these challenges. The research team identified short- and longer-term needs for Puerto Rico's recovery and resilience. In the short term, Puerto Rico needs to repair damaged critical infrastructure; improve governance and fiscal accountability; update emergency-preparedness plans; clearly delineate responsibility for infrastructure, assets, and services; and repair damaged and destroyed homes. In the longer term, Puerto Rico will need to systematically address its economic challenges; scale its social services and infrastructure systems for current and future populations; reinforce its infrastructure against natural hazards and build it to modern standards; reduce building-permit and code-enforcement breaches; report timely and accurate data on its economic and fiscal status; and gather further knowledge to inform long-term resilience decisions.
Hurricane damage --- Hurricane Irma, 2017. --- Hurricane Maria, 2017. --- Puerto Rico.
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