Quantifying the effect of sea level rise and flood defence: a point process perspective on coastal flood damage

Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences 16, pp. 559-576, 2016, doi:10.5194/nhess-16-559-2016:

This paper proposes a stochastic framework to estimate the monetary losses from coastal floods in a confined region. For this purpose, it follows Peak-over-Threshold approach employing a Poisson point process and the Generalised Pareto Distribution. By considering the effect of sea level rise as well as potential adaptation scenarios on the involved parameters, it is possible to study the development of the annual damage. An application to the city of Copenhagen shows that a doubling of losses can be expected from a mean sea level increase of only 11 cm. These findings reveal the complex interplay of the involved parameters and allow conclusions of fundamental relevance. For instance, it shows that the damage typically increases faster than the sea level rise itself. This in turn can be of great importance for the assessment of sea level rise impacts on the global scale.