Implication of climate change predictions for flood and coastal defence research

Research investigating how climate change will change the shape of rivers, and what this means for designing and managing flood defences.

From:
Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management Research and Development Programme and Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs
Published
11 February 2021
Category:
Understanding risks from all sources of flooding
Topics:
Channel management, Climate change, Coast, Decision making with uncertainty, Deterioration, Flood forecasting, Flood risk assessment, Meteorology, Modelling, Resilient infrastructure, Surface water, Understanding physical processes
Project status:
Completed
Project code:
FD0205
Date of completion:
31 March 1999

Documents

Implications of climate change prediction for flood and coastal defence research - final report (101KB) WORD

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Details

This project reviewed the impact of climate change on the shape of rivers and how this will affect designing and managing flood defences.

The objectives of this project were to:

  • identify what research is needed to assess the possible impacts of climate change on coastal and river flood defences in the UK
  • review completed, current and new research into climate change and its relevance to how flood defences are designed and managed
  • investigate the usefulness of simple outputs from climate models to predict changes in the wave climate around the UK coast
  • consider what climate change might mean for river morphology in the UK

The research was based on:

  • a review of the R&D implications of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) second assessment report (SAR) for flood defence in the UK
  • an initial assessment of possible impacts of climate change on aspects of river and coastal flood defence

This project ran from 1995 to 1999 at a cost of £43,069.

Published 11 February 2021