#PlanetPartners: Collaboration lands £3.7m NERC funding for EvoFlood project to better predict global flood risk

• The EvoFlood project aims to create the next generation Global Flood Model – a state-of-the-art computer model which helps simulate the probability of flooding across Earth.

Flooding experts at the University of Reading are part of a new £3.7m project which aims to revolutionise our understanding of global flood risk.

Working as part of a consortium of nine UK universities, as well as multiple national and international organisations, the team has been successful in winning major grant funding from the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC).

The new project, titled EvoFlood, aims to create the next generation Global Flood Model – a state-of-the-art computer model used to simulate the probability of flooding across the Earth. University of Reading scientists will provide global flood time series by analysing model data from the European Centre for Medium-range Weather Forecasts.

Professor Hannah Cloke, a hydrologist at the University of Reading who is working with the team, said: “There are a lot of unanswered questions regarding rivers and when they will flood. The new methods we will develop in the EvoFlood project will increase our understanding of the influence of river shape as well as climate change on flooding, as well as how this is likely to change in future.

“Flooding turns people’s lives upside down. Improving flooding predictions will enable action to limit the destruction they cause.”

Globally, nearly one billion people are potentially exposed to the risk of flooding, with around 300 million on average being impacted by floods in any given year.

Faced with this vast societal challenge, reliable tools are urgently needed to predict how flood hazard and exposure will change in the years and decades to come.

Existing state-of-the-art Global Flood Models (GFMs) are used to simulate the probability of flooding across the Earth, but they do not represent the way river channels and floodplains change over time.

If rivers become shallower or wider, then their capacity to contain floods changes over time. Existing models that neglect this process therefore make poor predictions over the long term. It is this limitation that the EvoFlood team will tackle.

Using the latest advances in using cell phone technology to track shifting populations, the new models will also provide a greater understanding of how communities are exposed – and respond – to flood events.

The EvoFlood project will look to answer a number of key questions, including:

• What is the relative influence on flooding of changes in the climate versus changes in river shape?
• How will global flood hazard and risk change in the future?
• What does this mean for the functioning of Earth’s complex floodplains which are corridors of life across the globe?
• How do populations respond to flooding, and how can this knowledge be used to inform societal response in the future?

The EvoFlood team, led by the Universities of Hull and Southampton, is partnering with a wide range of key stakeholders to ensure that the results will make a positive societal impact.

Sue Manson, Principal Scientist at Environment Agency, said: “The Environment Agency is pleased to be a Project Partner supporting the EvoFlood Project, which aims to develop a new generation of global scale flood models.  

“We support the aims of the research programme which is committed to developing practical learning that will benefit current and future generations and I look forward to working with the project team.”

The project will also utilise the state-of-the-art Total Environmental Simulator at Hull which will be used to experimentally model river dynamics.

Follow the progress of the EvoFlood project on Twitter at @EvoFlood