Abstract
Flood damage has increased significantly and is expected to rise further in many parts of the world. For assessing potential changes in flood risk, this paper presents an integrated model chain quantifying flood hazards and losses while considering climate and land use changes. In the case study region, risk estimates for the present and the near future illustrate that changes in flood risk by 2030 are relatively low compared to historic periods. While the impact of climate change on the flood hazard and risk by 2030 is slight or negligible, strong urbanisation associated with economic growth contributes to a remarkable increase in flood risk. Therefore, it is recommended to frequently consider land use scenarios and economic developments when assessing future flood risks. Further, an adapted and sustainable risk management is necessary to encounter rising flood losses, in which non-structural measures are becoming more and more important. The case study demonstrates that adaptation by non-structural measures such as stricter land use regulations or enhancement of private precaution is capable of reducing flood risk by around 30 %. Ignoring flood risks, in contrast, always leads to further increasing losses—with our assumptions by 17 %. These findings underline that private precaution and land use regulation could be taken into account as low cost adaptation strategies to global climate change in many flood prone areas. Since such measures reduce flood risk regardless of climate or land use changes, they can also be recommended as no-regret measures.
Highlights
Of all natural hazards, floods are responsible for the largest economic losses worldwide (Munich Re 1997, 2004)
The results showed that parameters affecting snow melt and processes in the unsaturated soil zone were of high significance in the Upper Lech catchment
This study demonstrates that the complex model chain was successfully and consistently established in the study area and could be used 1) to quantify current and future flood risk, 2) to investigate the contributions of each driver to future flood risk, and 3) to estimate effects of non-structural adaptation systematically
Summary
Floods are responsible for the largest economic losses worldwide (Munich Re 1997, 2004). Climate change may contribute to an increase in flood losses in several regions due to an augmentation of flood frequencies and magnitudes. Ongoing settlement and economic development have led to a continuous increase in assets in flood prone areas. In developing countries, this trend is due to population growth. A few attempts have been made to assess flood risk by integrating possible future changes in both, climate and socio-economic development (e.g. Hall et al 2005; te Linde et al 2011; Elmer et al 2012; Beckers et al 2013; Jongman et al 2014). Changes in land use, economic development and climate were combined to achieve a more holistic, future-oriented flood risk analysis
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
