Using NOAA Tide Data to Estimate Flood Damages Along the Atlantic Coast

In this project, I developed a methodology to estimate flood damages for properties along the Atlantic coast. I used data from NOAA tidal stations between Southern Texas and Maine to calculate a Generalized Extreme Value (GEV) function at each tide station. I also implemented damage functions to calculate the expected flood damage for buildings of a specified elevation. I found that expected flood damages are highly sensitive to elevation, and vary considerably between different tide stations. Furthermore, regular storms contributed more to flood damages than hurricanes, which suggests that coastal resilience policies ought to focus more on regular storms and less on the most extreme hurricanes. That stands in contrast to the current discourse, which is largely centered on protecting against the most severe of hurricanes. These estimates of flood damages are useful in informing how much a fair insurance agent ought to charge for flood insurance premium rates for buildings at different locations and elevations along the coast. The results can also help inform policy to protect against flood damage. By projecting sea level rise into the future, I was also able to obtain estimates of how flood damages will increase over time.