The dominant remotely sensed measure of urban vulnerability to climate change is the land area predicted to be affected by sea level rise. However, urban areas are vulnerable to more than just sea level rise. The International Panel on Climate Change uses the concepts of exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity to define vulnerability.
The goal of this project is to explore how remote sensing can help measure exposure of urban areas to coastal hazards related to climate change. This study will improve current estimates of urban coastal vulnerability by considering multiple hazards as opposed to just sea level rise and demonstrating the ability of remote sensing to comprehensively measure this exposure. Additionally, most studies that measure exposure to coastal hazards and/or sea level rise only look at impacts to the coastline, neglecting the interaction with and resulting vulnerability of built cities and partnering urban ecosystem. Results of the proposed study will significantly improve our understanding of levels of exposure to multiple hazards and our ability to use remote sensing to globally measure global exposure at the city level. This will significantly improve urban climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies.