Impacts of Natural Disasters on Energy Systems

The impacts of natural disasters on energy systems have extensive ramifications for infrastructure development, the economy, public health, general quality of life, and even peaceful coexistence of communities, regions, and countries. For every country, energy security is a critical issue on which the provision of goods and services to an expectant population depends. Energy facilities and operating systems are the lifeblood of modern economies through powering of physical infrastructure and civil/industrial support services. The wealth, health, and stealth of nations generally correlate with energy-dependent industrialization.

Global commodities trading, driven mostly by crude oil, natural gas, and carbon dioxide, is expected to reach US$9 trillion by 2010. Perturbation or outright disruption of energy facilities and systems needs both preventive and mitigative actions. Increase in the number of energy facilities and complexity of storage, transfer, and distribution systems are the trend. Also, some provisions of the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act have catalyzed the development of plans for the manufacture and installation of many energy systems, including those that are focused on renewable energy.

Global crude oil and natural gas liquids production is expected to increase from 85.1 million barrels per day in 2004 to 101.5 million barrels per day by 2010 (Fletcher 2005). By then, the United States will need 2 million barrels per day while China will need 3 million barrels per day (Poten and Partners 2005). As reported by Jackson (2007), more than 500 petroleum-refining projects, including 66 new refineries, 180 upgrade projects, and 180 clean fuels projects, were planned as of 2006. Natural gas has also become a critical fuel for power supply and transportation in many countries. According to Quigley (2005), the 2003 global gas consumption was 2,591 billion ${\mathrm{m}}^3$ driven mostly by combined-cycle gas turbines for power generation and direct use in building heating systems.

On land and in the sea, massive and expensive infrastructure comprising drilling rigs, platforms, pipelines, power plants, and distribution lines, is threatened by natural and technological hazards. Rotary drilling rigs, which in the United States number as many as 1,300 in the Gulf of Mexico, are imperiled by hurricanes and underwater mudslides. For example, Hurricane Ivan, which affected the Mississippi River delta and the U.S. Gulf Coast, blew through 150 platforms and 10,000 miles of pipelines (Snyder 2005). Seven platforms were destroyed, with 24 others having significant damage, whereas 102 pipelines were damaged (Moritis 2005). Typhoon Songda of September 6–8, 2004, damaged and interrupted power supply to 1.5 million households in Japan and South Korea (ARI 2005).

Energy supply pipelines such as the Tayshet-Nakhodka pipeline planned by Japan, at the cost of $11–$16.2 billion (“Japanese” 2005), and the Alaska pipeline, valued at $15–$20 billion as the largest single civil engineering project in the United States (Dittrick 2005), will have to be protected from earthquakes, ground instability, and terrorism. Hurricane Jeanne of September 15–29, 2004, killed more than 3,000 people and caused economic losses at the level of $9 billion in the United States and Caribbean countries. In 2004, floods in New Zealand (February–April), Russia (April), China (June–August), Bangladesh, India, and Nepal (June–August), and Australia (December) and the devastating earthquake/tsunami combination that rocked Southeast Asia and East Africa on December 26, 2004, killed more than 200,000 people and caused economic damages in excess of $23 billion (ARI 2005). Within the past 8 years, North Carolina, with more than 2,000 miles of streams, has been significantly impacted by floods.

The catalog of natural disaster-induced damages to infrastructure and social systems cannot be considered complete without the inclusion of Hurricane Katrina, which ravaged the Gulf Coast of the United States in late August 2005. Immediate and long-term damages are estimated to reach US$100 million, and about 5 million people suffered from electric power loss. In the aftermath of this hurricane, the U.S. Coast Guard made the assessment that 56 U.S. Gulf offshore oil production platforms had been lost and/or damaged. One of the platforms was displaced from offshore by the hurricane through a distance of $20\mathrm{km}$ , to Dauphin Island in Alabama. Power failures and shutdowns/damages to refineries and distribution pipelines caused fuel shortages and caused gasoline prices to increase to as much as US$3 per gallon. The floodwater that inundated most of New Orleans and proximal areas contained sewage, decaying corpses and carcasses, and chemicals that posed immediate and longer-term risks to human health. Indeed, Hurricane Katrina has qualified as one of the worst natural disasters to hit the United States.

Because of the cascading effects of their damages on the economy and environmental systems, energy facilities need to be protected adequately from natural and technological disasters. The full range of preventive and mitigative actions and systems needs to be implemented. These fall into the following categories: regulations, reasonable policies, technical guidance systems, education, market incentives, and environmental management systems. As part of technical guidance systems, innovative systems for foundation improvement and structural strengthening in the sea and on characteristically unstable coastal margins need to be developed and implemented. Real-time hazard prediction systems and automatic structural response systems also need to be developed and used. It is reasonable to assume that future damages will be inversely proportional to the installation of such systems.