CRISIS · Coastal flood risk in Europe and the socio-economic impacts in a changing climate

Coastal flood risk in Europe and the socio-economic impacts in a changing climate

A large portion of the coastal population worldwide, including Europe, is already vulnerable to extreme high sea level events. In the future it is expected that climate change will increase coastal flood risk making costly adaptation (e.g. raising dikes and barriers, such as the Thames Barrier and Delta Works) inevitable. In order to help develop robust and flexible coastal management strategies, decision makers need to explore how, when, and where future changes in the physical environment will require immediate action. This is aggravated by the existence of large uncertainties in climate projections. Impact assessment models, such as the Dynamic Interactive Vulnerability Assessment (DIVA) model, have been used extensively to assess the socio-economic impacts associated with coastal flooding under climate change and to explore the benefits of mitigation, adaptation, and migration. However, because the DIVA model is applied at broad scales, it is based on a number of significant assumptions. Most notably, present-day return water levels (one of the key forcing parameters in the model) were derived using a simple global approach. In the future, one of the main consequences of mean sea level rise (MSLR) on human settlements and infrastructure will be an increase in the intensity and frequency of extreme sea levels (ESL). Hence, robust information on both MSLR and ESL is necessary for assessing impacts of and adaptation to MSLR. While substantial research efforts are directed towards quantifying projections and uncertainties of future global MSLR, corresponding uncertainties in ESL have not been assessed and projections are limited. Our results (see below for more details) highlight that uncertainties in present-day ESL are at least as important as uncertainties in future MSLR projections and both types of uncertainties need to be understood and combined to fully assess potential impacts and adaptation needs. Including our new estimates of ESL into broad-scale integrated impact assessment modelling frameworks will improve the overall results and facilitate better informed decisions.

Текст от CORDIS, на английски · Данни: CORDIS, © Европейски съюз