nexustandards.com/hazards · 4 taught
Hazards and Disaster Risk Reduction
NRS-C14 Resilience capability and maturity; NRS-M4 Vulnerability, fragility and resilience
4standards1discipline
Illustrative: a block model of a city with water rising and falling through its streets, a heat island over its core, or the city growing
Risk Academy, led by the Nexus Consortium · Hazards, Disasters and Resilience · Department of Disaster Risk Reduction and Early Warning
Preventing new risk, reducing existing risk and managing residual risk under Sendai
Disaster risk reduction
Disaster risk reduction works on the three terms of risk at once: hazard, exposure and vulnerability, with capacity against them.
- Courses
- 1 course open
- Levels
- L1 Introductory, L2 Intermediate
- Labs
- Exposure lab, Map lab, Network lab, Geo quiz, GeoAI lab
- The Sendai Framework and its targets
- Hazard, exposure, vulnerability and capacity
- National and local DRR strategies
- Risk-informed development
- Disaster risk governance and mandates
- Monitoring progress on DRR
- Nature-based risk reduction
- Prospective, corrective and compensatory risk management
02Maps
Build a twin of any place
Search any place or open the world; the layers and generators follow disaster risk reduction on the planet map, the globe and in 3D.
- Terrain 59 to 3,044 m
- 2 reference earthquakes, M7.5 to M7.8
- 3,643,786 people in the box, 2020
- Earthquakes M4.5 and above, past week: read live when the 3D twin opens
- USGS ShakeMap intensity contours: read live when the 3D twin opens
Drag to move, right drag or Shift with a drag to turn and tilt, Ctrl with the wheel to zoom. Keyboard: arrows move, Shift with arrows turn and tilt, + and – zoom, 0 resets, V steps through the views, Escape clears.
Flat plan of the same data: relief, the two epicentres with magnitude and depth, the WorldPop count grid and the numbers below. The 3D twin opens on devices that can draw it, once its data and code have been checked.
The boundaries, names and designations shown do not imply any judgement on the legal status of any territory, or any endorsement or acceptance of such boundaries. Countries: Natural Earth (public domain).
03The subject
The subject, methods and measures and debates and bodies
The field and its scope
For planners, risk governance officers, development practitioners and analysts who need to turn hazard, exposure and vulnerability information into strategies that prevent new risk and reduce the risk that exists.
Quantities and units
Methods and their limits
Each method is listed with what it assumes and where it fails.
What the field debates
Bodies that set practice, and the data they publish
Bodies and standards are named so that learners can find and apply their published work. The Academy teaches the use of that work and links to the publisher. No affiliation is implied.
04The method
From a loss curve to a benefit-cost ratio: how average annual loss, a discount rate and an investment decide whether risk reduction pays
A loss exceedance curve gives the loss at every return period; its integral is the average annual loss; a risk reduction measure lowers the curve; the avoided loss, discounted over the measure's life, against its cost gives the benefit-cost ratio a finance ministry asks for.
Sources: Shreve and Kelman, Does mitigation save? Reviewing cost-benefit analyses of disaster risk reduction (2014); Mechler, Reviewing estimates of the economic efficiency of disaster risk management (2016); Hallegatte, Vogt-Schilb, Bangalore and Rozenberg, Unbreakable: Building the Resilience of the Poor in the Face of Natural Disasters (2017); United Nations, Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030 (2015).
05At a glance
At a glance, with 5 related topics
Disaster risk reduction at a glance
risksacademy.comhazards-resiliencediscipline
- Open, 1
- In preparation, 2
- Also taught here, 4
- Subtopics, 8
Nexus Standards it teaches and relies on
The Nexus Standards the discipline teaches toward, grouped by master standard, with the disciplines that teach each.
nexustandards.com/systemic-risk · 1 taught
Systemic Risks
NRS-H62 Compound and multi-hazard events
1standard1discipline
Nexus Standards at the AcademyThe Academy proposes how each discipline teaches toward the Nexus Standards. The mapping is open for public review.
Research and tools
Research and preprints as they are published, by discipline, with the faculty's other tools.
The hub lists the newest research and preprints for Disaster risk reduction, each with its source and date. Open the research hub
Methods, frameworks and hazards
From the Academy's risk taxonomy: the discipline's own entries and those of its primary courses, with how many courses teach each.
What is changing now
Recent developments in disaster risk reduction, each with its source; sources checked on 16 October 2026.
Courses in this discipline
Courses with this as their primary discipline.
Courses from connected disciplines that also teach this field
Each course has its primary discipline elsewhere and teaches this field as part of its scope.
06Labs
How the subject is practised in labs
07Console
How Disaster risk reduction is taught, as a process you can run
Press Play to run this process from this page's own data.
Process explorer
How Disaster risk reduction is taught
18 steps6 stages
08Practice
Practice, learning and connections
How technology helps and what risk it brings
Achievements in this discipline
Pathways that teach it
Where the subject is practised
The three Foundry systems where it is practised
Disciplines it depends on
Across the ecosystem
09Take part
Take part in Hazards, Disasters and Resilience
Start from who you are.
10References
Core references and where to begin
Start with Wisner, then United Nations, then Lavell.
11Questions
Questions, answers and key terms
Is study here free?
Yes. Every course and learning material of Risk Academy, led by the Nexus Consortium, is free to study, self-paced or with a cohort. Ordinary participation has no fee; paid work, internships and fellowships are separate arrangements.
What does completing a course give me?
A completion record: the course, its version, the date and what was assessed, private by default and shared by you. It stacks into discipline, department and programme achievements. A record states what was studied and assessed and does not certify competence. A record is not a licence, a professional title or an employment status.
Where do the data and the places come from?
Every faculty teaches on a twin of a real place built from open data. Each layer carries its provider, licence and date, and every result on the Academy states its source. Maps and figures are indicators for teaching, never an assessment of a place.
How do I take part beyond the courses in disaster risk reduction?
Form a competence cell of three to seven people, study a shared pathway, take a supervised assignment in the National Working Groups, or bring a cohort from your institution. Open the page for organisations.
Key terms
Term
Disaster risk
The potential loss of life, injury or damaged assets in a period, as a function of hazard, exposure, vulnerability and capacity.
Term
Vulnerability
The conditions that increase the susceptibility of people, assets or systems to the impacts of hazards.
Term
Capacity
The strengths and resources available to manage and reduce disaster risk and strengthen resilience.
Term
Residual risk
The disaster risk that remains even when effective risk reduction measures are in place.
ReportsContribute
Contribute evidence from this page.
Reports is the Consortium's quarterly publication. What you know about this subject can become evidence, a case or a correction in the next edition, credited to you and published under CC BY 4.0 where it is your own work.
Risk Academy
Related
Around Disaster risk reduction
Disaster risk reduction
Start with an open course
The catalogue lists each course with its outcomes, labs, hours and level.