Abstract
ABSTRACTThe European ‘Floods Directive’ 2007/60/EC focuses on the development of flood risk maps and management plans on the basis of the most appropriate and advanced tools. This pushed a paradigm shift for moving to sustainable development through processes of stakeholder engagement to improve the efficiency and transparency of decision processes. In this context, this research project developed a free and open-source GIS software, called FloodRisk, to operatively support stakeholders in their compliance with risk map delineation and the management of current and future flood risk based on their needs for multi-purpose applications. In this paper, a high-resolution impact assessment framework based on 2D inundation modelling with different return periods was used, as input, within the FloodRisk model to reconstruct the socio-economic damages based on a case study showing how structural and non-structural measures can significantly decrease the cost of floods for households. The sensitivity of the FloodRisk model was also examined and it was found to be highly dependent on the selection of damage functions and the economic values of the exposed assets.
Highlights
In recent decades, flood damage throughout Europe has increased due to climatic changes, population growth and urban development in flood-prone areas (Barredo 2009; Munich RE 2015)
Flood risk management (FRM) efforts must deal with an observed increase in flood damage combined with the expectation that flood consequences will continue to rise due to changes in flood meteorological drivers, land-use patterns and socio-economic development (IPCC 2007; te Linde et al 2010)
We have developed a free and open-source Geographic Information Systems (GISs) software, called FloodRisk, that aims to support operatively diverse stakeholders in their compliance with flood risk management (FRM), through a transparent and collaborative approach
Summary
Flood damage throughout Europe has increased due to climatic changes, population growth and urban development in flood-prone areas (Barredo 2009; Munich RE 2015). These results, together with economic direct damages assessment, are able to support decision-making regarding the prioritization of risk prevention measures (in order to optimize investments), and the evaluation of different mitigation actions and insurance agencies (in order to improve the estimation of risk-based premiums for diverse spatial areas) on the basis of increased understanding of expected compensation payments These kinds of analyses can support engineers and companies working on site-specific flood prevention, and eventually, in post-event damages assessment (for example, to obtain information from simulated scenarios before data collection). May be due to the shape of the functions and the data (i.e. synthetic or empirical) used in their construction, the use of depreciative value or replacement value, and the inclusion of indirect costs in the damage estimates
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