Description: Provide risk-informed decision support to installations with reference to building condition monitoring for mold and moisture related problems. Develop approach for updating building condition index for DoD buildings in the BUILDER database to inform lifecycle analysis and maintenance/repair/retrofit decisions.
Description: Technology transition/stakeholder engagement in Delaware and Florida coastal regions to gauge and improve the perception of deploying natural bacteria to combat harmful algal blooms. ERDC-EL needs to better understand the biology of the aquatic invasive species Starry Stonewort (SSW) in its native environment to inform its behavior in non-native environments. ERDC understands the use of cyanophages as a mechanism of biological management for cyanobacteria-driven harmful algal blooms (HABs).
Description: Review research on the well-being benefits of nature and develop an approach to consider the distribution of nature benefits to community members in project planning.
Description: The United States Army Corps of Engineers water management is complicated by the presence of burn scars in the drainage basins that feed reservoirs, due to the changes in hydrology and geological flow risk that burn scars produce. The extent that these effects these are influenced by predictable atmospheric rivers is needed to better understand and develop decision support for West coast multi-hazards, especially those related to post-fire hydrology. Integrating hydrologic, atmospheric, and social sciences, this effort works towards a USACE decision support tool related to reservoir operations and emergency management. This project investigates statistical relationships of antecedent conditions using collected data sets to understand hydrologic watershed changes for pre- and post-fire conditions. (i.e., reservoir inflow distributions). Further, this work generates empirical models that consider uncertainty and predictability. Better forecasting of flood-inducing atmospheric river conditions related to burn hydrology will help emergency management prepare for potential natural hazards, which can save lives and reduce resource demands and associated costs, especially in infrastructure dense regions that are vulnerable to post-fire flood events. Better forecasting of fire-related hydrology changes will improve risk-informed decision making for water managers.
Description: Examining water infrastructure in Iraq in a decision framework.
Description: Showcase projects that have successfully implemented natural infrastructure projects and how they secured funding for all stages of the lifecycle.
Description: The ecosystem on Martha’s Vineyard water bodies is changing due to external pressures from climate change, development, and subsequent biodiversity disruptions that can cascade into other species. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers seeks to support managers, planners, and Tribal members to best support their culturally important ecosystems to ensure that species remain abundant. This project requires data collection and analysis, of culturally significant ecosystem organisms including eelgrass growth, herring habitat suitability, and sea level rise. This project will gather existing data, identify, and fill data gaps, to characterize the system, its challenges, and its adaptation options.
Description: Based on previous work examining collaboration among Steering Committee members of a FIRO project, the project will analyze aspects of collaboration over time, using the Howard Hanson FIRO implementation as a case study. Currently, the project will interview Steering Committee members to characterize aspects of collaboration at the beginning of the project. This can later be compared to responses to the same interview following the project’s conclusion to determine how change occurred over time and implications for Steering Committee membership and formation within future FIRO projections.
Description: Develop the Hurricane Evacuation Support Tool (HEST) to support real-time decision making for emergency managers and planners. Assist the National Hurricane Center (NHC) in modernizing their development and presentation of Hurricane Evacuation Studies (HES) to make them more accessible, efficient, and effective for emergency managers at all levels of government. Modernization also focused on streamlining the HES process to make it easier to update with new results from Hazard Analysis, Vulnerability Analysis, Behavioral Analysis, Sheltering Analysis, and Transportation Analysis.
Description: In collaboration with researchers at University of Georgia, a partner of the Network for Engineering With Nature, this project is developing and demonstrating a lifecycle management framework to support comparison of natural and conventional flood risk management measures. The researcher team is also developing a sediment budget for the Savannah River to quantify the availability of sediment that could be available to build and sustain coastal natural infrastructure.
Partner: Artesion, Inc.
Description: Infrastructure networks at military installations, such as power and water, are increasingly being integrated with cyber systems to improve visibility and control. At the same time, this integration can open these infrastructure systems up to new vulnerabilities and pathways for cascading failures. Therefore, this project has sought to develop methodologies for quantifying and strengthening resilience across different levels of cyber-energy systems, from ensuring resilient placement of sensors to examining the tradeoffs that edge computing can offer to balance efficiency and resilience. To bring these concepts together, the work has centered on developing a secure, zero-trust edge computing platform with the partner Artesion, Inc., that can allow federated data to be processed and delivered to end users even if normal networking services are disrupted. Results have been demonstrated at both Joint Base Lewis-McChord as well as ongoing work at Camp Humphries.
Description: Quantifying resilience measures for interconnected compounding threats. ERDC has identified a need for multi-hazard approaches to risk and resilience modeling for compounding threats. The threats posed by hazards, whether natural or manmade, are typically addressed separately for modeling purposes. However, when these threats occur concurrently, they can have non-linear impacts on communities. An integrated approach is needed to quantitatively model the complex interactions between compounding threats for a collective response because an appropriate response to a single threat alone can worsen the impacts of the other threat.
Description: Conceptualize and characterize the uniqueness of compound threats relative to system disruption, and where resilience fits in.
Description: Adapt tools from COVID to other stressors and integrate public health considerations in the design of military facilities (e.g., installations, VA hospitals, etc.) that would be resilient to future compounding threats. ERDC and USACE have been engaged in the response to epidemiological concerns. There have been shortages in supplies and services needed to treat hospitalized patients or process the surge of disease-related deaths, particularly the protective equipment necessary for staff working in healthcare, fatality management, and related industries. There is a need to develop predictive tools for the forecasting of demand and subsequent allocation of limited resources by responsible agencies.
Description: Resilient Supply and Demand Network Assessment. Disasters, both natural and man-made, can cause disruptions to infrastructure and strategic networks. This research models and quantifies different disruptions, subsequent system responses, and the overall results for system functionality. Further, recommends strategies for future responses to disruptions as well as planning initiatives that are poised to enable easier and faster recovery in the future. Expanding the analytical methodologies for network resilience would enable better planning for system management before a disruption, as it is occurring, and in the immediate aftermath. Improved system resilience will decrease the time that a system cannot provide its critical function according to its purpose in broader society.
Description: Communities in a watershed face a variety of natural hazards and man-made threats that are difficult to predict and anticipate. The resilience capacity of each community to absorb, recover and adapt to these threats depend on a number of critical functions in the watershed. There is lack of region wide risk and resilience analysis to show the impacts in the interdependent infrastructure systems within a watershed. The US Army Corps of Engineers owns and operates critical infrastructure in most major watersheds in the U.S., there are opportunities to improve resilience decision making process within the watershed. This research focuses on the Savannah River Watershed and the USACE infrastructure located within the watershed, to develop replicable processess to identify and assess interdependent critical infrastructure within any watershed. The effort will also enable participants to achieve the level of resilience they desire in their community and establish an enduring culture of resilience.
Description: Resilience for the port of LA transportation resilience. ERDC is establishing a new Scientific Focus Area (SFA) on Disaster Response and Resilience. Disasters, both natural and man-made, can cause disruptions to infrastructure and strategic networks. This research will support different aspects of the proposed SFA. Further, it will recommend strategies for future responses to disruptions as well as planning initiatives that are poised to enable easier and faster recovery in the future. Expanding the analytical methodologies for network resilience to enable better planning for system management before a disruption, as it is occurring, and in the immediate aftermath. This improved system resilience will decrease the time that a system cannot provide its critical function according to its purpose in broader society.
Description: Evaluate the resilience of the Target Hill wastewater treatment plant and explore options for maintaining its operation at reduced functionality during electric grid outages. Evaluate the feasibility of anaerobic co-digester to support plant energy resilience.
Description: Provide risk-informed decision support to installations with reference to building condition monitoring for mold and moisture related problems.
Description: This project is working to characterize the risk of coal combustion residue surface impoundment failure with a risk indictor approach and expert elicitation. The effort is newly expanded to include community resilience in locations with legacy fossil energy waste.
Check out our current job openings