Joe Clarke - Research Engineer, with Halcrow, Cohort 4 (2009-10 start)
Supervisors: Dr. Dawei Han (Academic supervisor), Dr. John Davis (Systems supervisor)
According to the Environment Agency, there are up to 5.5 million properties at risk from flooding in the UK. With the prospect of climate change and continuing floodplain development, flooding is only going to become more of an issue.
A general consensus is forming that it is not sustainable (or indeed possible) to simply build flood defences to try and prevent flooding altogether. We need to develop a portfolio of flood responses that tackles not just the chance of a flood occurring, but which also finds ways to reduce the impact of a flood if it does occur.
However, these “non-structural” flood responses are typically difficult to assess, due to their complex interaction with the people and communities that they benefit, and so are often paid lip service. This project aims to redress this imbalance by finding a way to appraise non-structural flood responses alongside traditional flood defences.
The project is still in its early stages, so work to date has mainly involved studying the current ‘status quo’ and best practice methodologies and drivers, and looking at ways that existing tools could be adapted to include non-structural responses
