By Ap van Dongeren
Recent and historic high-impact storm events have demonstrated the vulnerability of coastal zones in Europe. This coastal vulnerability is likely to increase due to two effects:
- As a result of predicted climate change, the hazards of sea-level rise and coastal flooding (due to marine storms and fluvial run-off) may increase.
- As a result of on-going coastal development, the impact (or consequences) will increase.
Without adaptation, flood damage on European coasts will increase up to 17 billion Euros per year (IPCC, AR 2015). With this view of the future, coastal authorities need to assess the level of impact and the risk of their coastal zones, and implement Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) measures to prevent or mitigate coastal disasters. Therefore, as part of the FP7 project RISC-KIT project, methods to identify high-risk coastal areas and to assess the effectiveness of DRR measures in coastal zones, have been developed, in order to guide effective disaster risk prevention and management. RISC-KIT is an EU-funded project, with 18 partners across Europe and coordinated by Deltares, The Netherlands.
The RISC-KIT toolkit, which is publicly available as freeware or Open Source, comprises five tools that have been validated for ten case study sites around Europe. The tools can be plotted on the Disaster Management Cycle (see Figure below). This cycle describes the stages of action that take place after a disaster has occurred. The Storm Impact Database records the impacts of previous disasters. The Coastal Risk Assessment Framework (CRAF) determines where the areas of highest risk are. Potential solutions have been aggregated in the web-based Management Guide. These solutions are tested for effectiveness using the Hotspot Tool, while the Multi-Criteria Analysis (MCA) Tool helps determine what solutions are suitable and acceptable in consultations with end users and stakeholders.