Definitions

A Public‑Private Partnership (PPP) is generally understood as a long‑term contract between a government entity and a private‑sector partner to provide a public asset or service, with significant risk and management responsibility transferred to the private party, and remuneration linked to performance.  [29]

A DB(F)M contract is an integrated contractual arrangement in which the execution of several components of an infrastructure project is entrusted to a single private partner, the private contractor. Under a DB(F)M agreement, the private contractor assumes responsibility for virtually all operational aspects of the infrastructure project: Design, Build, (Finance), and Maintain.  [30]

The operational & maintenance (O&M) phase is the long‑term operational period during which the completed infrastructure is kept in service, with the project company responsible for inspections, preventive maintenance, corrective repairs, performance monitoring, and ensuring the asset meets contractual service levels. 

This phase begins once the asset has passed testing, commissioning, and formal handover.  [31]

Resilient infrastructure refers to infrastructure systems that are designed, built, and managed to withstand, absorb, recover from, and adapt to a wide range of shocks and stresses, including natural hazards, climate‑related events, technological failures, and cascading disruptions.  [11]

The Critical Infrastructures are physical structures, facilities, networks and other assets which provide services that are essential to the social and economic functioning of a community or society.  [32]

The Asset Vulnerability are the conditions determined by physical, social, economic and environmental factors or processes which increase the susceptibility of an individual, a community, assets or systems to the impacts of hazards.  [32]

Performance‑based design is founded on the premise that structural systems must meet specific performance objectives. Specific performance expectations are set for the completed design… The design is completed by demonstrating complying performance through analysis, simulation, testing, or a combination thereof.   [33]

Hazard = A process, phenomenon or human activity that may cause loss of life, injury or other health impacts, property damage, social and economic disruption or environmental degradation.  [32]

Vulnerability = The conditions determined by physical, social, economic and environmental factors or processes which increase the susceptibility of an individual, a community, assets or systems to the impacts of hazards.  [32]

Disaster Risk = The potential loss of life, injury, or destroyed or damaged assets which could occur to a system, society or a community in a specific period of time, determined probabilistically as a function of hazard, exposure, vulnerability and capacity.  [32]

The Natural Hazards are predominantly associated with natural processes and phenomena.  To be opposed with Anthropogenic Hazards, or human-induced hazards, are induced entirely or predominantly by human activities and choices.  [32]

Climate proofing is the process through which projects are screened, assessed, and adjusted to ensure their resilience to future climate conditions and their consistency with EU climate objectives, including the reduction of greenhouse‑gas emissions and alignment with the Paris Agreement.  [47]

The Triggering Process is an event or process that initiates or activates a hazardous phenomenon or disaster event. For example an intense rainfall triggering landslides, heatwaves triggering wildfires and glacier collapse triggering debris flow.

The Compound Hazard is the combination of multiple drivers and/or hazards that contributes to societal or environmental risk.  Like storm + heavy rainfall.

The Secondary Hazard is a hazard that occurs as a consequence of another hazard or disaster event.  Like floods causing contamination.

The movement of a mass of rock, debris, or earth down a slope. Earthquake shaking and other factors can also induce landslides underwater. These landslides are called submarine landslides. Submarine landslides sometimes cause tsunamis that damage coastal areas.   [36]

Rockfalls are abrupt movements of masses of geologic materials, such as rocks and boulders, which become detached from steep slopes or cliffs. Separation occurs along discontinuities such as fractures, joints, and bedding planes, and movement occurs by free-fall, bouncing, and rolling. Falls are strongly influenced by gravity, mechanical weathering, and the presence of interstitial water.  [36]

A debris flow is a form of rapid mass movement in which a combination of loose soil, rock, organic matter, air, and water mobilizes as a slurry that flows downslope. Debris flows include <50% fines. Debris flows are commonly caused by intense surface-water flow, due to heavy precipitation or rapid snowmelt, which erodes and mobilizes loose soil or rock on steep slopes. Debris flows also commonly mobilize from other types of landslides that occur on steep slopes, are nearly saturated, and consist of a large proportion of silt- and sand-sized material. Debris-flow source areas are often associated with steep gullies, and debris-flow deposits are usually indicated by the presence of debris fans at the mouths of gullies. Fires that denude slopes of vegetation intensify the susceptibility of slopes to debris flows.  [36]

This is a variety of very rapid to extremely rapid debris flow.   [36]

Rock-ice avalanches are defined as rock and debris avalanches that involve ice, firn, or snow from initiation by the failure of high-mountain rock-ice walls, steep glaciers, or the entrainment of ice along their propagation paths.  [37]

A sinkhole is a depression in the ground that has no natural external surface drainage. Basically, this means that when it rains, all of the water stays inside the sinkhole and typically drains into the subsurface.  Sinkholes are most common in what geologists call, “karst terrain.” These are regions where the types of rock below the land surface can naturally be dissolved by groundwater circulating through them. Soluble rocks include salt beds and domes, gypsum, limestone and other carbonate rock.  [36]

A flash flood is a flood of short duration with a relatively high peak discharge.  [32]

A storm surge is an abnormal rise of water generated by a storm, over and above the predicted astronomical tide.  [38]

The removal of sediment or engineered materials from the bed or banks of a watercourse is known as ‘river scour’ and can occur when the forces imposed by the flow on a sediment particle exceed the stabilising forces.  [39]

A Glacial Lake Outburst Flood (GLOF) is a sudden discharge of a large volume of water from a glacier- or moraine-dammed lake.

A snow avalanche is a mass of snow, often mixed with ice and debris, moving rapidly downslope under the influence of gravity.

An ice avalanche is the rapid downslope movement of a mass of ice resulting from the collapse of a glacier, glacier tongue, hanging glacier, serac, or ice-covered slope.

An ice avalanche is the rapid downslope movement of a mass of ice resulting from the collapse of a glacier, glacier tongue, hanging glacier, serac, or ice-covered slope.

Permafrost degradation is the warming, thawing, and loss of perennially frozen ground, resulting in a reduction of the extent, thickness, or ice content of permafrost.

Clay shrinkage is the decrease in volume of a clay soil resulting from loss of water from its pore spaces and adsorbed water layers.

Soil swelling is the increase in volume of a soil mass caused by the absorption of water.

Subsidence is the downward movement of the Earth’s surface relative to a datum such as mean sea level.

Actions aimed at strengthening the capacity of a system to resist, absorb, recover from and adapt to climate-related or natural shocks.   [32]

Adjustments in natural or human systems in response to actual or anticipated climate stimuli, aimed at reducing or mitigating their adverse effects.  [34]

Determines the magnitude of potential cost impacts from climate hazards on infrastructure systems.  [36]

The range of risks, perils and insured amounts covered by an insurance policy.

An additional financial cost required by investors or insurers to compensate for a higher level of risk.

A contractual mechanism allowing the private partner to buy back a provision or a risk initially allocated to another party, generally in exchange for a payment or a contract revision.

The process of revising a project’s schedule, budget or baseline assumptions when the initial conditions are no longer valid (e.g. due to climate change, inflation or emerging risks).

The distribution of risks between the parties to a contract (public and private) according to their respective ability to manage them at the lowest cost.

An unforeseeable, irresistible and external event preventing the performance of a contract (e.g. earthquake, war or natural disaster).

A financial reserve intended to cover unforeseen costs related to identified or unidentified risks.

A fund dedicated to future maintenance, renewal or repair costs of an asset throughout its lifecycle.