According to a report published Wednesday, almost all of the US has experienced a climate disaster in the last five years.
According to a report by Rebuild by Design, a nonprofit that helps communities prepare for and recover from disasters, the U.S. has suffered from 20 billion-dollar disasters in the last five years.
The report analyzed which parts of the country have experienced the greatest number of disasters, which parts of the country are getting more money to rebuild than others, and which areas have experienced the longest power outages.
California, Iowa, Mississippi, Oklahoma and Tennessee each experienced at least 20 disasters during the last decade, according to the report. New York, New Jersey, North Dakota and Vermont received the most disaster recovery funding.
Kentucky and Louisiana have counties that have experienced more than a disaster every year over the last ten years. Louisiana has received more federal disaster aid per person than any other state.
Amy Chester is the managing director of Rebuild by Design and co-author of the report.
Over the last 10 years, Nevada and Arizona have only had three and six federal disaster declarations, respectively. The states had the worst rankings for heat- related deaths.
It took us a while to understand why some states had low disaster counts. Arizona and Nevada have experienced extreme heat, which is the top climate killer, but heat waves do not get federal disaster declaration.
Extreme heat is the leading cause of weather-related deaths in the U.S.
According to the report, the financial losses from recent disasters are more than the amount of federal recovery funds. The amount of federal disaster recovery funds obligated or provided during the same period totaled $103 billion, less than 4% of the total losses or need for repair and replacement, according to a report.
According to the authors of the report, in order to avoid future losses, the country should prioritize resilience projects with higher return on investment ratios and that states should impose a 2% surcharge on insurance premiums.
Chester said that most of the federal policies came in after a disaster. We need to adapt our infrastructure to meet our current and future needs before communities suffer.