Impact of Climate Change on Landslide Susceptibility – for the Case in Taiwan

Due to the impact of climate change, the increasing frequency of extreme rainfall events, with concentrated rainfalls, commonly cause landslide hazard in the mountain areas of Taiwan. Although the extraordinary rainfall behavior is critical for the geohazard, it is significantly affected by the factors such as topography, the route of typhoon, etc. Therefore, there are uncertainties for the predicted rainfall as well as the landslide susceptibilities.

This study employs rainfall frequency analysis together with the atmospheric general circulation model (AGCM) downscaling estimation to understand the temporal rainfall trends, distributions, and intensities in the adopted study area in Central Taiwan. The uncertainties within the rainfall prediction was investigated before applied to the landslide susceptibility analysis. The catchments in Taiwan, including Tachia River, Wu River, and Chuoshui River, were adopted as the study area. To assess the hazard of the landslides, logistic regression methods and supporting vector machines method were applied, in which the control factors were analyzed and discussed. The results of predictive analysis with the consideration of uncertainties can be applied for risk prevention and management in the study area.