Adam Smith

Adam Smith is an applied climatologist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) National Centers for Environmental Information–Climate Science and Services Division. He is the lead scientist for the U.S. Billion-Dollar Weather and Climate Disasters program (https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/billions). Smith performs research to standardize and integrate many public and private sector disaster data sources into better quality-controlled disaster cost frameworks as research tools. 

This includes socioeconomic exposure and vulnerability data, given that weather and climate extremes cause disproportionate physical, social, and economic impacts on vulnerable populations: https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/billions/risk

Example report: Hurricane Ida's Impact On Socially Vulnerable Communities

Smith regularly briefs the Science for Disaster Reduction working group on U.S. disaster costs and is an NOAA expert on U.S. disaster loss data in support of the international Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (2016-2024), the American Meteorological Society Committee on Financial Weather Risk Management (2015–2024) and the interagency Hazards and Natural Capital Accounting Working Group.

Smith is also the U.S. representative on the new World Meteorological Organization expert team for Cataloguing of Hazardous Weather, Water, Climate, Environmental and Space Weather Events. The purpose of this team is to establish globally agreed standards and procedures for identifying and cataloging hazardous weather, climate, water, and space weather events has hampered the routine characterization and tracking of such events and associated losses and damages.

For more in-depth analysis, see the 2023 U.S. billion-dollar weather and climate disasters annual report