Collaborating to Develop a Common Flood-Costing Methodology
Written by Thean Acres
In In addition to causing immense infrastructure and environmental damage, floods place major economic burdens on communities. From Quebec to Texas, Chihuahua and beyond, North Americans grapple with this reality every year.
Understanding the economic cost of these extreme events is central to addressing their impact on communities and allocating adequate resources for monitoring and preparedness. That’s why we’ve been working on the Costing Floods and Other Extreme Events initiative with partners from all over North America.
Recently these collaborative efforts took us to Vancouver, British Columbia, where we hosted a workshop with our partners, the Pacific Water Research Center, and others to discuss methodologies that will support and better prepare communities for future flooding events.
Here’s a brief summary of that meeting and the importance of this work as written by Thean Acres of the Pacific Water Research Center:
The PWRC hosted an expert workshop for the project in September 2019. The workshop was held to review the proposed flood costing methodology, identify and build partnerships around shared objectives and discuss future actions. The participants represented the three countries with professionals from government agencies, the insurance sector, research and academia and other enterprises. The workshop drew on the unique knowledge each attendee brought from their industry and country. Then, workshop participants jointly worked to identify key elements of a common methodology that can be used for estimating damages and losses incurred by floods.
Some interesting highlights from the participant’s findings are shared here. It was noted that economic impacts included in the methodology for estimating flood-related damages and losses must be applicable to all CEC countries, data must be useful and usable across sectors, well-being and intangible costs need to be adequately accounted, particular attention must be paid to the gap between insured losses and total losses, and data can be difficult to obtain such as private information within insurance companies.
Several recommendations were made about how to move forward. Ensuring information access was a key proposal. This would include an openly available centralized database to share information on economic impacts from floods, information and indices the provide a composite picture of vulnerability and exposure levels, and a glossary of terminology would be useful across industries. To complement this information, a clear definition of what constitutes “extreme” flooding and different flooding types would be beneficial. Looking at the impact of flooding at the watershed level was also brought forward as more inclusive approach. This discussion set the stage for a more specified dialogue on how to create a common method for costing of flood-related damages and losses.
Attendees worked together to build recommendations for a method that would be comprehensive, easily understood and widely applicable. A main takeaway from the conversation was that damages and losses should be categorized using the same terminology as the insurance sector. Specific categories were set with considerations of direct damages, indirect effects and losses/additional costs across the social sector, infrastructure, economic sectors, and emergency assistance. Subsequent expert workshops will be held in the United States and Mexico where the finalized methodology and case studies will be reviewed and additional stakeholders, particularly Indigenous communities, can provide further insights.
The vision of the PWRC is to promote and mobilize research that addresses water issues on multiple scales ranging from local communities to national to global. This project takes the work of the PWRC internationally and leverages our resources to bring together stakeholders across industries. The research resulting from this project will benefit disaster resilience across communities and contribute to better policy across North America.
Follow along with the Pacific Water Research Center on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram to learn more and stay up to date with our activities.
We respectfully acknowledge that the PWRC operates on the unceded traditional territories of the Coast Salish peoples of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations.
This story originally appeared on the Pacific Water Research Center blog
The statements and opinions represented in CEC Medium articles are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the positions or views of the CEC or the governments of Canada, Mexico, or the United States.
To learn more about the Costing Floods and Other Extreme Events initiative visit our website. Stay up to date with our other work on twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.
