Combining Co$ting Nature and Suitability Modeling to Identify High Flood Risk Areas in Need of Nature-Based Services.

Sara Prybutok,Galen Newman,Garett Sansom,Zhihan Tao,Kayode Atoba

doi:10.3390/land10080853

Sara Prybutok, Galen Newman + Show 3 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/land10080853

Copy DOI

Journal: Land	Publication Date: Aug 1, 2021
Citations: 9	License type: CC BY 4.0

Affiliation: Texas A&M University, Texas A&M University at Galveston

Abstract

Coastal areas are often subject to the severe consequences of flooding from intense storms or hurricanes. Increases in coastal development have amplified both flooding intensity and negative impacts for coastal communities. Reductions in pervious land cover and replacement with impervious ones have reduced the amount of ecosystem services. This research examines the services provided by nature-based solutions by applying outputs from Co$ting Nature models into suitability models to quantify ecosystem services along the Texas Coast. Results show that only around 13% of the Houston-Galveston coastal area has relatively high NBS, and nearly of the area shows relatively low NBS. The majority of the areas lie in the middle, which, due to increases in development, are at particular risk for becoming areas offering low NBS in the future if not treated. Such vulnerability assessment informs future implementation strategies for NBS in coastal communities to protect people and property from flooding.

Highlights

Much of the natural coastal landscape has been rapidly converted to urbanized area over the last few decades, causing and amplifying major flood issues for cities in close proximity to the coast [1]
We began our spatial analysis by identifying locations where nature-based solutions (NBS) can be most useful along the H-G MSA coastline (See Figure 1) by collecting data from various open geodatabase sources
The outputs indicate that most areas with the lowest amount of NBS are already highly developed and populated, comprising 13.84% of the total study area

Summary

Introduction

Much of the natural coastal landscape has been rapidly converted to urbanized area over the last few decades, causing and amplifying major flood issues for cities in close proximity to the coast [1]. This is problematic for fast growing coastal urban communities. Increases in the vast amount of impervious surface impedes water infiltration, increases surface stormwater runoff, and causes a greater frequency and intensity of flooding [4]. On the 20th of February of 2010, Portugal’s island of Madeira was hit by torrential rainfall that triggered catastrophic flooding which accounted for 45 deaths; such flooding issues are projected to increase due to lack of green space, increased impervious surfaces, and forecasted climate changes [8]

Methods

Results

Conclusion