Hazomes beyond climate zones: global multi-hazard disturbance regimes

Multi-hazard disturbance regimes shape ecosystems and long-term societal responses to risk, yet they are rarely captured in global classifications. We introduce hazomes, a description of terrestrial multi-hazard disturbance regimes based on open-source intensity and return period data for eight major hazard types. Hazomes characterizes the long-term hazard environments under which ecosystems and societies have recently evolved, providing a regime-scale perspective relevant to disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation.

Using two complexity–diversity metrics, we show that hazomes capture patterns of disturbance complexity that are not represented by climate zones or biomes. We further demonstrate that geographically distant regions, including cities, can share the same hazome, indicating similar disturbance histories. Such hazard disturbance analogues offer opportunities to study convergent ecological adaptation and cultural learning, and to support cross-regional transfer of adaptation and risk management strategies.

By shifting the focus from individual events to long-term disturbance regimes, the hazomes framework complements existing multi-hazard assessments and supports regime-oriented analyses of resilience under climate change.