As is mentioned in Inventory Data a damageable element is required to estimate flood damages or impacts in HEC-FIA. A variety of types of elements associated with HEC-FIA structure inventories are discussed in this chapter. In some cases the inventory must be augmented with additional information. For instance, to estimate loss of life risks the structure inventory must be supplied with population estimates.
Structure inventories are often generated specifically for a project. However, if no local structure inventory is readily available, users can access the National Structure Inventory (NSI) base layer. The NSI base layer represents modified data from the HAZUS dataset, and covers the entire United States at a coarse level. Instructions for importing local (parcel or point shapefiles) structure inventories is provided in Create a Structure Inventory.