RAPID: Earthquake Debris Management in Haiti: Data-driven Decision-Support

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This Rapid Response Research (RAPID) grant provides support for the collection of data related to debris management and its modeling. Debris is the waste generated by hazardous events such as a natural disaster or a terrorist attack. This is a critical and often overlooked problem. Debris impacts the logistics of humanitarian relief and can generate debris in some large-scale disasters equivalent in volume to years of normal solid waste production in the affected areas. In the context of the Haiti earthquake, blockage of the roads by debris was one of the key factors in the humanitarian organizations inability to deliver aid to the victims in the immediate aftermath, even after aid had arrived at the Port-au-Prince airport and ports. Almost two months after the earthquake, many sources cite debris removal and disposal as one of the biggest challenges going forward and estimate that these activities will take more than five years to complete. Debris removal is a costly and long, complicated process requiring the careful consideration of both short and long term effects. If successful, this research will provide an integrated model that considers interactions between the decision problems in all three phases of debris management operations (clearance, collection, and disposal). These models and decision aid tools will be greatly enhanced through testing and tuning using scenarios based on the collected real data. Existing literature on debris removal is very limited and this work will open new venues both in the modeling and solution of this problem as well as create publicly available data sets for testing. Through data collection, analysis, and documentation of operations a case study describing the effects of debris and its removal on the delivery of humanitarian aid and access to critical facilities in the aftermath of the Haiti earthquake will be created. It is envisioned that the developed tools will be used not only in tactical and operational phases but also during the comprehensive policy evaluation phase.