Quantified scenarios analysis of drivers and impacts of changing flood risk in England and Wales: 2030–2100

Flood risk to the economy, society and the environment reflects the cumulative effects of environmental and socio-economic change over decades. Long-term scenarios are therefore required in order to develop robust and sustainable flood risk management policies. Quantified national-scale flood risk analysis and expert appraisal of the mechanisms causing change in flood risk have been used to assess flood risk in England and Wales over the period 2030–2100. The assessment involved the use of socio-economic and climate change scenarios. The analysis predicts increasing flood risk unless current flood management policies, practices and investment levels are changed—up to 20-fold increase in economic risk by the 2080s in the scenario with highest economic growth. The increase is attributable to a combination of climate change (in particular increasing precipitation and relative sea level rise in parts of the UK) and increasing socio-economic vulnerability, particularly in terms of household/industrial contents and infrastructure vulnerability. The policy implications of these findings are discussed.     

Is there a trade-off between households’ precautions,mitigations and public protection for flood risk?

This paper evaluates willingness-to-pay (WTP) for flood insurance and floodgate installation in Tainan, Taiwan, and finds that household flood precaution (observing the water level) has a minor effect in terms of increasing the WTP for flood insurance, rather than decreasing it. The reason for this is that people who have public flood protection nearby do not lower their WTP for floodgate and insurance, and those who live near the water source of floods and exhibit precautionary behavior have higher risk perceptions and intend to pay more. The adopted mitigation (having sandbags or other barriers) will not affect the intention to further mitigate or buy insurance. This also means that adverse selection in relation to flood insurance is not serious in the flood-prone area of Tainan. Households may be aware of the limitation of public flood protection though the precautionary behavior, and found that flood insurance can compensate for most of the flood damage.     

Insurance and flood risk reduction in Ghana: do insurers penalise homeowners who take precautionary measures?

Today, many advocate insurance as a tool for coping with natural disasters. Beyond providing prompt financial relief to victims of disasters, insurance can also incentivise individuals to invest in preventive measures if insurers reward such efforts with reduced premiums. However, insurers might be unable to reward investments in precautionary measures with lower premiums if they are ill-informed about individual-level risks. Here, we explore how Ghanaian home insurers respond to investments in flood risk reduction by asking them to quote premiums for four identical buildings; two had investments in flood risk reduction, while the other two had none. We find that insurers did not reward investments in risk reduction, with some charging higher premiums for elevated buildings, suggesting they have interpreted such preventive measures as a sign of high flood risk. This failure to reward investments in precautionary measures may discourage insured homeowners from investing in risk reduction.     

How to get there? Assessing motorists' flash flood risk perception on daily itineraries

Flash floods are characterized by their suddenness, fast and violent movement, rarity, small scale but high level of damage. They are particularly difficult to forecast accurately and there is little lead time for warning. This makes motorists especially vulnerable. Assuming that these flash flood hazard specificities may be the significant factors leading to difficulties for drivers to perceive danger, we used cognitive mapping combined with GIS data processing to assess motorists' flash flood risk perception on their daily itineraries. The analysis of 200 mental maps collected allows planners to have maps highlighting dangerous areas where risk perception is weak and to identify reasons for this.     

Commuting patterns of Czech households exposed to flood risk from the Bečva river

Using unique data collected in October–December 2012 we estimate the link between commuting for work and level of individual exposure to floods. We find that commuters on average have higher earnings than non-commuters. Individuals affected by one flood commute by 11.2% more than unaffected individuals. We conjecture that the increase is linked to intentions to cover flood-related losses, decrease households' vulnerability to flood risk or out-migrate from the risk areas. Individuals affected by at least two floods are by 20.2% less likely to commute relative to those unaffected. We explain this non-linear effect by the fact that many households out-migrate after the first flood. Stayers commute less, because they are different from non-stayers in some underlying characteristics related to education, employment and family circumstances, which strongly affect commuting behaviour. We further find that in a commuting family an individual is by 53.8% more likely to commence commuting relative to a non-commuting family. Choice of commuting destination is often similar to that of other family members.     

Adaptive flood hazard management strategy and its effect on settlements in the lower Yellow River area in Ming–Qing China: a case study of Kaifeng Prefecture

This paper examines the settlements and embankments of the Yellow River in central China in late imperial China (late fourteenth century to the early twentieth century) through the approach of historical geographical information system. The Yellow River frequently flooded and changed paths in the lower Yellow River area, creating a disaster-prone environment in the populous capital city, Kaifeng in Henan Province. The official policies of constructing embankments in the alluvial fan for the sake of both preventing flood and ensuring canal transportation for grains were important factors in shaping the settlements of the region. Historical data from some counties in Kaifeng Prefecture indicate that people took shelter along the embankments during floods and, as a consequence, villages steadily developed along the embankments. This is in despite official restrictions on the use of the bottomlands along the Yellow River. This historical case not only illustrates the operating modes of official flood prevention strategies in dynastic China, but also shows how archaic settlement patterns and landscapes have shaped the geography of contemporary China.     

Have flood mortality qualitative characteristics changed during the last decades? The case study of Greece

Despite the dramatic increase in recorded flood events in Greece in the last decades, recent findings show that related mortality does not show a corresponding rise. This work develops and studies a database of flood-related fatalities to investigate qualitative changes in flood mortality in the country between 1960 and 2010. Observations show a shift in the circumstances under which fatal incidents occurred and in the demographics of the victims. In particular, indoor fatalities and cases in urban environments gradually decrease in favour of incidents occurring outdoors, in rural settings, mostly using motor vehicles. The number of fatalities per flood event show a decline, indicating that multiple-fatality incidents are gradually disappearing and that advances in protection have an impact on mortality. The increase in the use of vehicles, the improvements in the structural integrity of buildings and the advances in early warning and civil protection practices are found to influence mortality both in qualitative and in quantitative terms.     

Disaster and Economy

1TheGeneralRelationshipbetweenDisasterandEconomyTherelationshipbetweendisasterandeconomyisaconverseone,thelatterisoftenthreatenedanddestroyedbytheformer.Thegreaterthedisaster,thegreaterthedestructiontotheeconomy;themoretheeconomydevelops,thegreaterlossesdisastermake.Thishasalreadybeenprovedbythehistory.AccordingtothestatisticsreleasedbytheUnitedNations,thelossescausedbythedisastersofallcountriesallovertheworldare(U.S.)$20~30billioneachyear,(U.S.)$44billionin1991;thecompensationsforthelosse…     

The Disaster of Abnormal Floods and Waterloggingin the Huai River Valley and Its Prevention and Redu

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Couple Model of Forecast and Assessment for Drought and Waterlogging Disasters

ByusingthetheoreticalstudyofAtmosphericScience,SoilScience,HydrologicalScience,Agri-culturalScienceandGeographicalScienceincludingdroughtandwaterloggingdisasters,acouplemodelofAtmosphere-Soil-RiverValley-Vegetationasanorganicwholeisestablishedforfore-castingandassessingdroughtandwaterloggingdisasters.1IntroductionChinaisoneoffewcountriesthatnaturaldisastersoccurfrequentlyandcausegreateconomiclosses.Inrecentyears,economiclosscausedbydisastershasreachedmorethanloobillionyuan,accountingfor3…     

Qinghai Mountain Disasters and Countermeasures

The eastern part of Qinghai Province is situated at the interface of the Loess Plateau and theQinghai-Xizang Plateau,while the northern part is located in the inland of the Qinghai-XizangPlateau.The Province has a high altitude,complicated topography and atrocious environment,suffers from serious soil erosion,and isafflicted with various frequent,widespread geological dis-asters that cause great damages.The impacts of human economic activities have intensified thisfeature.According to inco…     

Restoration and Rehabilitationof Degenerate Upland Ecosystem

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NATURAL DISASTERS IN BANGLADESH-National and International Response

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Information on Safety Education for Seismic Resistance and Disaster Prevention in Middle and Primary Schools in Anhui Province

Inordertocoordinatethedevelopment0fIIInternationalDecadeforNaturalDisasterReducti0ntIactivity,safetyeducationforseismicresistanceanddisasterpreventionisdeeplyundertakeninmostyoungsters.AccordingtoIIstrengtheningtheworkf0rseismicpreventionanddisasterre-ductioninmiddleandprimaryschoolstudents)IformulatedbyStateEducationCommission,re-centlyAnhuiEducationCommissi0nandAnhuiSeism0logicalBureaujointlyissuedIIInf0rmaboutsafetyeducationofseismicpreventi0nanddisasterreducti0ninmlddleandprlmarysc…     

Training as an Element of Post 1991 Flood Disaster Recovery in Anhui and Jiangsu Provinces and in De

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Concept of Flood Risk Map and Its Application

1 The concept of flood risk map and its mapping procedure Flood risk management is the process for analysis and assessment of flood risks as well as to form and implement the disaster mitigation plans. Flood risk analysis is the basic work of flood risk assessment and management that can provide people with the possibilities of flood occurrence and its risk in specific areas and consequently raise the public awareness of flood help to form a reasonable flood prevention plan. However, flood ris…     

Linking the stressors and stressing the linkages: Human—environment vulnerability and brownfield redevelopment in New York City

This paper suggests that the mitigation of one hazard—soil contamination—can unintentionally affect vulnerabilities and perceived vulnerabilities to additional stressors in the local human—environment system through a study of brownfield redevelopment in New York City. This study employs a Vulnerability Scoping Diagram (VSD) approach to identify components that contribute to vulnerabilities and perceived vulnerabilities in the local community, based on the thematic analysis of 55 interviews with residents from four neighbourhoods with brownfield redevelopment activities in New York City. This analysis of resident observations and perceptions of post-redevelopment hazard conditions indicates how mitigating vulnerability to one urban hazard—soil contamination—has the potential to affect vulnerabilities and perceived vulnerabilities to additional hazards like flooding and air pollution because of the complex linkages among multiple stressors. A causal model of vulnerability to the unintended impacts of brownfield redevelopment is subsequently developed to further demonstrate the interactive linkages among exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity to multiple stressors. This study also provides measures that stakeholders can monitor and evaluate over time to track the socio-spatial and environmental implications of brownfield redevelopment and subsequent changes in the local human—environment system.     

Numerical Model and Simulating Technology of Severe Disasters

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The Climate-traffic Assessment Model Research and Annual Assessment

Wehavestudiedtheclimateimpactonthetrafficsystemformanyyears,butmostresearcheswerestillquantitativeanalysis.Thispapermakesasearchfortheclimate-trafficassessmentmethod,establishinitialquantitativeanalysisassessmentmodelofclimate-traffic,andassesstheclimateimpactonthetrafficsystemin1996.1TheImpactofRainstormandFloodontheTrafficSystemin1996Inl996,theclimateisabnormalinagreatpartofChina.Manyclimatedisastersoccurred.A-mongthesedisasters,theheavyrain,floodandheavyfogmadeseriousinfluenceonthetraffi…