Reconsidering the risk assessment concept: Standardizing the impact description as a building block for vulnerability assessment

Risk assessments for natural hazards are becom- ing more widely used and accepted. Using an extended defi- nition of risk, it becomes obvious that performant procedures for vulnerability assessments are vital for the success of the risk concept. However, there are large gaps in knowledge about vulnerability. To alleviate the situation, a conceptual extension of the scope of existing and new models is sug- gested. The basis of the suggested concept is a stadardiza- tion of the output of hazard assessments. This is achieved by defining states of the target objects that depend on the impact and at the same time affect the object's performance characteristics. The possible state variables can be related to a limited set of impact descriptors termed generic impact description interface. The concept suggests that both haz- ard and vulnerability assessment models are developed ac- cording to the specification of this interface, thus facilitating modularized risk assessments. Potential problems related to the application of the concept include acceptance issues and the lacking accuracy of transformation of outputs of exist- ing models. Potential applications and simple examples for adapting existing models are briefly discussed. risk to ensure the overall quality of risk assessments. Vul- nerability analysis is probably the area that is both the least developed and most difficult one to address, requiring that available knowledge and resources are used to their full ex- tent.