News Seismic Risk: A Changing Landscape - GEM Shares Insights at ADB Webinar By: Dec 14, 2023 Oct 25, 2023 Share Facebook LinkedIn The Asian Development Bank (ADB) hosted a virtual knowledge session on October 25, 2023, titled "Seismic Risk: A Changing Landscape," highlighting the evolving nature of seismic threats impacting vulnerability and risk assessment. Moderated by Belinda Hewitt, ADB's Senior Disaster Risk Management Specialist, the session featured key experts, including Matt Gerstenberger from GNS New Zealand and Helen Crowley, Secretary General of the GEM Foundation. Gerstenberger kicked off the session, discussing New Zealand's 2022 seismic hazard model update, which revealed a 50% average increase in modelled seismic hazard. His contribution provided valuable insights into the potential implications of hazard updates for countries across Asia and the Pacific. Helen Crowley then took to the stage, sharing GEM's pioneering initiatives in seismic hazard and exposure mapping. She focused on applied research in the USAID-Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance-supported FORCE project , where innovative tools such as machine learning are being employed to forecast global exposure to seismic hazards under varying future scenarios. Crowley emphasised GEM's potential role in guiding resilient planning and investments, stating: "Understanding global exposure to seismic hazards is fundamental for informed decision-making to support risk mitigation. GEM's seismic hazard, exposure and risk maps serve as robust tools on this front, guiding resilient planning and investments. Leveraging machine learning for exposure and vulnerability forecasting, we aim to better understand future seismic risk scenarios that can aid ADB and member countries in making risk-informed investments and prioritising resilient interventions." The webinar's theme emphasised the need to adapt to the evolving nature of seismic risk. The presentations by Gerstenberger and Crowley underlined the urgency of staying ahead in seismic risk assessment. Such insights can guide ADB and its member countries towards better understanding and mitigation of seismic risks, fostering more resilient communities in vulnerable regions. GEM's active participation in the event, highlighted by Helen Crowley's contribution, shed light on innovative methodologies that are proving promising in addressing future seismic risk. The webinar served as a platform for knowledge exchange, stressing the need for proactive measures in confronting the ever-changing landscape of seismic hazards. No images found. GALLERY 1/0 VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS FACT BOX

News A glance at the OQ hazard component By: Jul 2, 2018 Share Facebook LinkedIn A paper recently published on the latest issue of Seismic Research Letters presents the main features of the OQ-engine hazard component, and particularly how they have been developed, the process adopted and their possible applications in earthquake hazard modelling. As quality assurance (QA) and testing in hazard analysis, and in scientific computing in general, are becoming critical elements of any practical application, the paper concentrates also on describing the manner in which the OQ-engine, and its development process, fulfils these important requirements. Learn more about the OQ-engine and take the chance to test it yourself through OATS system (OpenQuake Alpha Testing Service). No images found. GALLERY 1/0 VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS FACT BOX

News Launch of the Global Model for Earthquake Social Vulnerability and Resilience (SVR) By: Nov 25, 2020 Share Facebook LinkedIn The ability to model characteristics within socio-economic systems that affect how populations prepare for, respond to, and recover from adverse impacts from earthquakes is an integral part of earthquake risk reduction. This is because the impact potential from earthquakes extends beyond direct physical impacts and loss of life, to account for the interconnectedness between earthquake hazard, the built environment, and the socio-economic characteristics of populations. As such, socioeconomic conditions can increase or decrease the potential for harm or loss during an earthquake event and after the event in terms of the differential recovery potential of populations. During this side event, the Global Earthquake Model (GEM) will officially launch its methods, metrics, and tools for the global assessment of social vulnerability and integrated risk from earthquakes. The launch will include the showcasing of GEM’s global integrated risk products coupled with the discussion of the methods used to develop a set of three internally and externally validated maps that will be used to demonstrate social vulnerability, economic vulnerability, and recovery potential from earthquakes worldwide. As such, GEM’s side event aims to present the current state of social vulnerability modelling at the global scale, and to discuss in-depth the future work needed to downscale the global social vulnerability modelling effort at the sub-country and city level. It will also be an important opportunity to discuss how this methodology for assessing social vulnerability and resilience to earthquakes can be applied to other hazard impacts, including disease or other natural hazards. Register at Bookmark our event page: . This page will contain the link to join our session, so make sure to check it again next week. See you soon! No images found. GALLERY 1/2 Gallery VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS FACT BOX

News GEM participates in the 2nd Scientific Seminar of the Knowledge Centre for Disaster Risk Management: Science for Policy and Operations By: Jul 2, 2018 Share Facebook LinkedIn GEM participated in the 2nd Scientific Seminar of the DRMKC held from March 9-10, 2017 in Rome. This year’s theme is Science for Policy and Operations. Paul Henshaw, representing GEM presented the capabilities and latest features of the OpenQuake engine, GEM’s state-of-the-art, open source software for seismic hazard and risk modeling, to a group of interdisciplinary experts on Disaster Risk Management and Climate Change Adaptation including scientists, practitioners and policy-makers at national, regional and international levels as well as first responders, and private sector representatives. This year’s seminar aims to address the challenges for policy and science in Disaster Risk Reduction including Disaster Risk Management capabilities assessment and Sendai monitoring framework, and to draw concrete recommendations for the upcoming Global Platform that will be held in Cancun, Mexico in May. The 2-day seminar attracted around 100 inter-disciplinary experts on disaster management, early detection, forecasting, warning and risk assessment of natural and man-made disasters, in both the fields of civil protection and humanitarian aid. The Italian Department of Civil Protection hosted the 2nd Annual Scientific Seminar from 9-10 March 2017, Rome, Italy. No images found. GALLERY 1/0 VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS FACT BOX

News Governing Board meeting 2018: new partners, GRM2018 status and expert panel review report By: Jul 12, 2018 Share Facebook LinkedIn The GEM Governing Board officially welcomes a new Advisor sponsor - PartnerRe into the GEM family during its first meeting in 2018 held from June 28-29 at the GEM headquarters in Pavia, Italy. PartnerRe joined GEM earlier this year. Paul Della Marta, official representative of PartnerRe, said, “This new partnership with GEM further strengthens our ability to create risk transfer solutions that provide financial protection from the devastating effects of earthquakes. We are particularly impressed by GEM’s collaborative, interactive approach in working with its stakeholders, and are proud to support GEM in their goal of worldwide earthquake resilience”. The Board also voted to adjust GEM’s standing rules on partnership and sponsorship, making the process more flexible, easier and accessible to a wider group. For more details on how to partner with GEM, download our latest brochure here. The 2-day meeting was highlighted by the progress report on the Global Earthquake Hazard and Risk Model 2018 (GRM2018) and the initial feedback from the expert panel review. Marco Pagani, Hazard Team Coordinator and Vitor Silva, Risk Team Coordinator and concurrent Social Vulnerability lead presented comprehensive reports on the status of the GRM2018. With only a few regions left being worked out, the GRM2018 is poised to make its first release on 5th December 2018.In addition to the status reports, the GRM2018 expert panel review chair, Tom deGroove summarized the panel’s findings saying that, “GEM is on target to launch the first version of its Global Model by the end of this year as planned. We consider this to be an excellent achievement.” The Panel, consisting of seven international experts met on 18-19 April 2018 at the offices of the GEM Foundation in Pavia, Italy with the objective of providing advice to the GEM Governing Board on the effectiveness of GEM’s development of the global earthquake hazard/risk model, and the future direction and character of the model. Below is an excerpt from the final report lauding GEM’s efforts to produce a global model by end of 2018. “The Panel commends GEM’s work to develop the most comprehensive assessment of earthquake hazard and risk on a global scale that has been achieved to date. The hazard and physical risk components of the Model are at a mature level of development. The social vulnerability modelling, whilst evolving rapidly, requires further development before products should be released as part of the global hazard and risk model. The Panel recommends that GEM’s work continues to be driven by the principles of collaboration, credibility, openness and public good, and that GEM continues to address the needs of the private sector as well as the global policy agenda of disaster risk reduction and sustainable development.” The meeting wrapped up with a discussion on GEM’s future program post-2018. Board members supported GEM’s 3-point agenda (OQ development and core products maintenance; application of science; and extending capabilities into new areas and markets), but pointed out the need to add social vulnerability and communication support in its future program. No images found. GALLERY 1/0 VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS FACT BOX

News New Horizon 2020 project launched to develop an advanced approach for Seismic Risk Assessment of Nuclear Power Plants By: Nov 3, 2020 Share Facebook LinkedIn The METHODS AND TOOLS INNOVATIONS FOR SEISMIC RISK ASSESSMENT (METIS) H2020 Project has been officially launched opening a promising research collaboration to improve confidence in nuclear safety by advancing the approach utilised for seismic safety assessments for Nuclear Power Plants. The major goal of METIS is to propose innovations in tools and methodologies for seismic safety assessment of reactors, and supporting technology transfer from the research community to the industry. It aims to develop common guidelines for seismic safety assessment at the European level, in line with international practice and consensus, and promote good practices across the community. The outcome contributes to facilitate risk-informed decision-making in the European context. The advanced tools and methodologies developed by METIS will be made available to a wider community thanks to the capitalisation in modern high-performance open source tools as OpenQuake, code_aster/ salome_meca, OpenSees, and SCRAM. METIS is an EU-funded 4-year project under the Horizon 2020 EURATOM Programme for Research and Innovation having a total budget of €5 million, of which €4 million is funded from the European Commission. The project will be delivered by an international consortium gathering 13 European partners from France, Germany, Italy, Greece, UK, Ukraine and Slovenia alongside with 3 organisations from US and Japan. The consortium brings together universities, research organisations and industrials so as to create an ideal ecosystem for research, development, and its dissemination and application by end users. The consortium had a virtual kick off meeting held over two days 29th-30th September 2020 attended by 78 participants. The first day was the plenary session which outlined all the Work Packages’ (WP) and on the second day, there was a WP coordination session for more detailed discussion. “We are really excited to start this project, where we aim to improve confidence in nuclear power plants and their competitiveness using advanced seismic safety assessments. In these challenging times, we had a successful collaboration with all the partners to build up METIS and get it funded by H2020 Programme. Our recent kick-off meeting, while held remotely, was a really successful event with high engagement from all partners promising a rich and effective collaboration going forward.” Electricté de France EDF R&D UK Centre Limited Liability Company Energorisk Fondazione GEM GeoForschungsZentrum Institut de Radioprotection et de Sûreté Nucléaire University School for Advanced Studies Pavia LGI National Technical University of Athens Géodynamique et Structures State Scientific and Technical Center for Nuclear and Radiation Safety Technical University of Kaiserslautern University of Ljubljana Geotechnical Research Institute North Carolina State University Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Institute For further information contact: Emma.Luguterah@edfenergy.com or 0208 935 2714 Electricité de France (EDF) was set up in 1946 out of the desire to have a national electrical utility that could help rebuild the country after the Second World War. Since its creation, the company has had the responsibility for generating, transmitting, and distributing electricity in France. EDF remains one of the European utilities with a significant R&D activity and effort on innovation. Around 2500 people are presently employed at EDF R&D, amongst which, 70% are researchers and executives. EDF is today one of the leading energy companies, with solid positions in major European countries. EDF is committed to creating long term, low carbon affordable energy and the safety and sustained performance of nuclear and hydraulic plants is one of the key issues in this regard. EDF participates in the project through its research and development (R&D) unit. EDF R&D has the mission to contribute to increasing performance, efficiency and safety of operating units of EDF Group. Collaborative research projects are a vital component for EDF, creating an invaluable forum for exchange and knowledge-sharing. Through them, innovations are developed, disseminated, and industrialized. EDF R&D is also a major national player in opensource simulation software development and dissemination. In particular, it develops and disseminates code_aster opensource Finite Elements Software www.code-aster.org. Website address: Horizon 2020 is the biggest EU Research and Innovation programme ever with nearly €80 billion of funding available over 7 years (2014 to 2020) In addition to the private investment that this money will attract. It promises more breakthroughs, discoveries and world-firsts by taking great ideas from the lab to the market. Horizon 2020 is the financial instrument implementing the Innovation Union, a Europe 2020 flagship initiative aimed at securing Europe's global competitiveness. EURATOM aims to pursue nuclear research and training activities with an emphasis on continually improving nuclear safety, security and radiation protection, notably to contribute to the long-term decarbonisation of the energy system in a safe, efficient and secure way. By contributing to these objectives, the Euratom Programme will reinforce outcomes under the three priorities of Horizon 2020: Excellent science, Industrial leadership and Societal challenges No images found. GALLERY 1/0 Gallery VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS FACT BOX

News TREQ2020 – Capacity development and OpenQuake online training, year in review By: Jan 23, 2021 Share Facebook LinkedIn The TREQ project is assessing earthquake risk at community level in three metropolitan centers in Latin America: Quito, Ecuador; Santiago de los Caballeros, Dominican Republic; and Cali, Colombia. In order to cope with the current pandemic, the GEM team shifted the capacity training and on-site workshops to online activities. Aiming to continue and strengthen the local participation in the project activities, 12 OpenQuake online training sessions (3 hours each) have been conducted for more than 200 people in several Latin American countries, with predominant participation from the three TREQ countries (Ecuador, Colombia, and Dominican Republic). The online workshops have increased the reach of the training sessions beyond its original scope. Free online working sessions are available through a dedicated website available in English and Spanish, https://www.training.openquake.org/ , allowing participants around the globe to engage in OpenQuake training activities for earthquake hazard and risk assessment. The online sessions are divided into four modules that cover the basic concepts: Introduction to OpenQuake and Open Source Tools for Earthquake Hazard and Risk Assessment, Earthquake Scenarios, Probabilistic Seismic Hazard Assessment (PSHA), and Probabilistic Event-Based Risk Assessment. All the materials generated for the workshops have been incorporated into the training website. The project team has collected more than 200 responses with excellent and encouraging feedback, which helped the team to shape and improve the material and content of the training. Below is some of the feedback from the participants. “A great course! Very useful for us to start doing work using this great powerful software.” - Zivko Terzic, Melbourne, Australia I really liked the experience and I would like to take this workshop to my students of the Master's Degree in Earthquake Engineering so that we can do research projects." - Maribel Guzman, PUCMM, Dominican Republic "Delighted with the information presented and the material is excellent, including the modeling software" - Hernán Suárez, Risk Management Unit - Municipality of Quito, Ecuador "Congratulations on the development of the tool and your training! Very very interesting and useful." - Srahyrlandy Rocio Díaz, Risk management secretariat, Cali, Colombia "Excellent explanations. Excellent materials and Excellent speakers" - Jonatan Arreola, CENAPRED, Mexico Upcoming OpenQuake online training workshops are scheduled for February and March, 2021 . For more details, visit https://www.training.openquake.org/register . Next steps Expansion to other regions In 2020, the activities focused in Latin America, giving special emphasis to materials and sessions in Spanish. But in 2021, the TREQ project team is keen on expanding and improving the training activities to other regions, by providing materials in English and promoting the online training in Asia and Africa. Training the trainers Within the context of TREQ, five professors of civil engineering - Ana Beatriz Acevedo (EAFIT, Colombia), José Carlos Gil (UMG, Guatemala), Mario González ( UABC, Mexico), Manuel Alfredo López (UES, El Salvador) and Rolando Castillo (UCR, Costa Rica) - are preparing an academic course on seismic hazard and risk assessment. The course is being structured to be taught to undergraduate and master students over the course of an academic semester (15 to 16 weeks) using the training material from TREQ, including the manual for the development of seismic hazard and risk models, video tutorials and evaluation exercises on fundamentals of seismic risk and the use of OpenQuake. The training materials are already being used at EAFIT and will be presented for approval in the other universities in 2021. No images found. GALLERY 1/7 Gallery VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS FACT BOX

News GEM and AXA partnership aims to enhance loss modelling capabilities to make better risk decisions By: Mar 17, 2020 Share Facebook LinkedIn AXA joined GEM at the end of last year as a sponsor to collaborate on enhancing loss modelling efforts for seismic events through sharing of hazard and risk data, engineering expertise, and technology to proactively mitigate property loss. AXA is the property and casualty, and specialty risk division of AXA offering a complete range of insurance and reinsurance products to enterprises of every kind and size in over 200 countries and territories. AXA’s goal is to make communities better prepared for natural hazards, such as earthquakes. The partnership with GEM is expected to help AXA achieve their goal further, especially at a time when increasing intensity of natural disasters has made managing exposures more challenging than ever. GEM’s team of scientists and engineers will work with AXA on advancing more sophisticated technology and data analysis tools that can help risk managers more proactively assess and mitigate their exposures. “GEM and AXA share a common approach in reducing risk such as data transparency and teamwork that we believe are significant factors in mitigating and managing risks worldwide. We are happy to team up with AXA and we look forward to fruitful collaboration in the years ahead,” John Schneider, Secretary General, GEM Foundation. Ultimately, providing companies with critical data enables a more proactive approach to resilience, which reduces the potential severity of future losses, and helps risk managers to make better business decisions on how to improve their risks. For more information about AXA, visit No images found. GALLERY 1/0 VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS FACT BOX

News Oasis Conference Summary 2022 By: Dec 6, 2022 Share Facebook LinkedIn GEM participated in this year’s Oasis Conference held on September 28th in Zurich. John, who sat in the Collaboration to Enable Choice panel presented a background on GEM’s roadmap to 2030 focusing on integrated risk and resilience solutions, and earthquake loss models for China, Colombia, and South Africa. He also discussed the collaborative process used in the joint development of the China Earthquake model with his co-panelists Ole Hanekop (Senior Actuarial Analyst at Hannover Re) and Michael Ewald (Earthquake Perils Lead at Swiss Re) who both shared their insights from the intensive and technical collaboration that helped developed the model for the Oasis platform. Martin Bertogg, Swiss Re's Head of Cat Perils, Cyber, and Geo shared his insights on what’s really needed: an intensified focus on more than just the key perils, a consistent use and sharing of models across the value chain, and an ever-greater effort of co-creating open-source models as they boost efficiency, risk literacy and trust. (Eckhart, Oasis 2022 flashback) “OASIS, OED and GEM are ready-made assets for co-creation for efficiency, risk literacy and broadly supported outcomes,” said Martin Bertogg in his summary of the conference. This year’s conference highlighted how Oasis works in practice, including a live demo on how to deploy and use Oasis. Participants also directly experienced the latest climate modelling techniques and the challenge of uncertainty in decision-making. No images found. GALLERY 1/6 Gallery VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS FACT BOX

News GEM supports new multi-stakeholder initiative on open data sharing between finance, policy and climate sectors By: Oct 9, 2019 Share Facebook LinkedIn Icebreaker One, launched on September 23 at the recent UN Climate Action Summit in New York, is a new independent, non-partisan, global non-profit that is developing shared principles, practices and open standards in order to unlock information that is vital to informing the kinds of large-scale financial decisions that are needed to minimize carbon and environmental impact. “GEM is pleased to support the Icebreaker One initiative and its activities to help bridge data gaps between finance, assets, policy and science to deliver not only a zero-carbon future, but also a safer and more disaster resilient future.” – John Schneider, Secretary General. GEM supports Icebreaker One as Strategic and Founding Partner, and will contribute to case studies demonstrating global public-private partnerships, data sharing, and associated impact in the disaster risk reduction (DRR) space. GEM has developed global exposure and vulnerability data that can be used to help Icebreaker One leverage for more open data exchange within an appropriate governance and data-sharing framework. According to Gavin Starks, founder of Icebreaker One, “The lack of good data-flow is leading to misallocation of resources, missed opportunities and is creating catastrophic risks on our global balance sheets.” “Building multi-disciplinary partnerships, based on decades of experience with open standards, data governance, mass collaboration, and public-private partnerships, Icebreaker One will unlock the exchange of decision-critical data to enable a multi-trillion dollar shift in investment.” Over the remainder of 2019 Icebreaker One will be narrowing its focus on the following options as test cases: shipping, agriculture, aviation, water and energy infrastructure. If you would like to get involved, please visit: https://icebreakerone.org/join/ No images found. GALLERY 1/0 VIDEO RELATED CONTENTS FACT BOX