This web viewer provides a map of the European Seismic Risk Index calculated using the European Seismic Risk Model (ESRM20), developed within the scope of the European Horizon 2020 project SERA. More information including documentation of this model is provided here.

The European Seismic Risk Index is calculated by dividing the average annual loss by the GDP per capita. Two types of loss are considered: economic loss (in Euros) and loss of life. The resulting economic risk index and loss of life risk index are then normalised using min-max normalisation. Given that both indices are heavily skewed by the extreme range of population and/or property value densities between urban and rural communities, a cube root transformation is applied before min-max normalisation.
The average of the two indices is then found, leading to a final seismic risk index that varies from 0 to 1, and which has been mapped to the following qualitative categories of risk: very low, low, moderate, high, very high. The seismic risk index has then been disaggregated to a hexagonal grid, with a height of 0.17 decimal degrees, using a GHS POP 2019 spatial raster dataset of population, and the values have then be spatially smoothed (with a kernel size of 0.2 degrees).

The NCEI/WDS Global Significant Earthquake Database (http://doi.org/10.7289/V5TD9V7K, accessed 16/09/2020) can also be added as an additional layer to the map.

The OpenQuake-engine, an open-source seismic hazard and risk calculation software supported by the GEM Foundation, was used to calculate the risk metrics of ESRM20.

H. Crowley, J. Dabbeek, V. Despotaki, D. Rodrigues, L. Martins, V. Silva, X. Romão, N. Pereira, G. Weatherill, L. Danciu (2022) European Seismic Risk Index Viewer (v1.0), DOI: 10.7414/EUC-ESRM20-RISK-INDEX-VIEWER

This work is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0): https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

economic loss: losses due to direct damage caused by earthquake ground shaking in the residential, commercial and industrial building stock, considering structural and non-structural components and building contents

average annual economic loss: the long-term mean economic loss value per year due to earthquake ground shaking

average annual loss of life: the long-term mean number of fatalities due to earthquake ground shaking per year

seismic risk index: a comparative index that has been calculated by dividing the average annual losses from the 2020 European Seismic Risk Model by the GDP per capita.

GDP: Gross Domestic Product