How Hurricanes Hurt Infrastructure

Immediate devastation to water, power, and other systems is bad enough. But what about secondary impacts?

Hurricanes are among the most destructive forces of nature, wreaking havoc on critical power, water, communication, and transportation systems. Yet by causing long-lasting disruptions to lives and communities, the secondary impacts of downed infrastructure often rival the severity of the more dramatic direct and immediate damage.

Water Infrastructure

Winds, floods, and storm surges may disrupt water treatment and distribution systems so that drinking water is contaminated and drinkable drinking water is in short supply. These health hazards are accompanied by others: waterborne illness, dehydration, heat exhaustion, toxic-mold-inflicted respiratory problems.

Damage to water infrastructure impacts can also cause trouble for agricultural and manufacturing industries—and not just in the regions most walloped by a storm.

Decentralization enables water infrastructure to better withstand hurricanes.

Instead of connecting long stretches of pipe to a single large facility, this infrastructure strategy reimagines water infrastructure as an array of smaller plants dispersed throughout a service area. Although it can handle the same load as a more centralized setup, the smaller plants and pipe gauges permit quicker repairs. And if one or two facilities get pulverized by a storm, the damage does not cripple an entire regional system.

Decentralized systems also enjoy various economic, environmental, and technical advantages, and they tend to provide more sustainable water solutions than those provided by traditional centralized plants.

Power Infrastructure

Blackouts don't just kill the lights. They may also kill healthcare services. Within hours, food begins to spoil in refrigerators. Air conditioners become useless, and there is nowhere to go to escape even life-threatening heat.

Prolonged power outages caused by damage to power lines, transformers, and other grid components can in turn cause shortages of food and water that endanger health and impose socioeconomic disruptions. When people must leave their homes because they have lost critical services, social networks, community cohesion, and mental health all suffer.

Decentralized electrical grids also cope with hurricanes better. As in the case of water systems, the smaller scales involved makes such grids easier to repair. And when one or two nodes go down, an entire region is not plunged into darkness.

The National Renewable Energy Lab has been working with innovative microgrids and autonomous energy systems to increase the resilience of grids when slammed by hurricanes and other shocks.

Telecommunication Infrastructure

The CDC stresses the importance of staying informed with up-to-date information during hurricanes. But, of course, hurricanes often damage cell towers, phone lines, and other aspects of communication networks, often making it is difficult or impossible to contact emergency services or for agencies to coordinate their responses. Financial and other transactions may also become untenable.

Disruptions to this infrastructure may also cause longer-term damage to education, employment, and other aspects of a vital economy.

Transportation Infrastructure

Hurricanes often take a heavy toll on roads, bridges, and other transportation networks. Floods or landslides may wash out roads and high winds may send trees and power lines smashing into the path of traffic. Clogged transportation arteries prevent hurricane victims from reaching hospitals, break supply chains, and make it hard to do anything. Local flight delays caused by the storm can trigger ripple-effect delays throughout the country. In the long run, tourism may take a hit and fewer jobs may become available in the transportation industry and related industries.

The Need for Hurricane-Resilient Infrastructure

Even if a person’s family, home, and possessions make it through a hurricane unscathed by direct damage, damage to infrastructure may trigger a cascade of indirect impacts that harm industries, regions, municipalities, neighborhoods, and, ultimately, everybody. Regional shocks often reverberate to some extent throughout the country.

As the 2022 hurricane season reminded us, infrastructure from Central America to Nova Scotia may lie in the path of the next hurricane. Hurricane-resilient infrastructure is everyone's business.