Network Interdependencies

While infrastructure network risks are typically understood network by network, such networks are increasingly reliant on each other. These interdependencies are not often modelled due to their number and complexity, but this work is vital due to the cascading impacts various network disruptions can have on one another.

The Network Interdependencies project developed the National Interdependent Infrastructure Model to better understand where critical interdependencies exist and how disruption spreads within each network and across others following various natural hazard events and the range of hazards they create. Through testing different hazard scenarios, the model enabled researchers to characterise and quantify disruptions, and identify where Aotearoa New Zealand’s most vulnerable communities were.

Understanding where critical infrastructure dependencies and societal vulnerabilities exist is fundamental to ensuring effective pre-event investment and post-event decision making.