Shifting to a Monetized Quantitative Approach for Risk Analysis Using Property Damages

This paper describes the estimation of economic damage arising from a water main break as a means of calculating the economic consequence of failure. This shifts away from factor-based, qualitative approach where factor inputs are grouped into bins, which tend to contribute to a slimmer amount of variance. An element of subjectivity also comes into play in the form of making the cut-offs and determining which factors will influence the risk scores and by how much (in the form of weighted scores). A proposed quantification of damage is presented arising from the significant consequence of a large diameter pipe failure caused by the discharged water. The pipe burst simulation utilizes surface modeling to determine the flooding area caused by a large diameter pipe failure. With the simulation results, the amount of damage is estimated by using the water depth resulting from the discharged water and the building type and size that will be affected. By utilizing cost damage information from U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the consequence of failure is better represented compared to a qualitative approach where the use of spatial distance and pipe attribute information is commonly used. Examples are presented which simulate different scenarios depending on the urban setting, the intensity of the pipe break, and the emergency response time of the water main break.