Construction Capacity and New Housing Demand Caused by Tornados

Recent research shows that construction of new houses takes the majority of the recovery time after a tornado. The rapid procurement of new houses depends largely on the existing construction capacity in the region affected. In this study, information about the construction industry in a tornado-prone region is extracted from U.S. economic Census data by using NAICS (North American Industry Classification System) categories. The present capacity of the construction industry is calculated by extracting (1) the inventories of materials and supplies, and (2) the value of new houses put in place in a targeted tornado-prone region, in this study, Oklahoma. A method is proposed to calculate the extra construction capacity in the targeted region using the information extracted from U.S. Census data. The extra construction capacity hence calculated is then compared to the anticipated need for new houses after a severe tornado, calculated by considering the historical records of damages caused by past tornados. The results of the study indicate that the existing construction capacity in the Oklahoma region is not enough to rapidly respond to the anticipated need for new houses after a tornado.