Institute of River and Coastal Engineering

The programme, involving 10 European research institutes, will develop flood resilience systems. It will seek to develop innovative and smart technology and products and to introduce new systems. The emphasis is on cost effective solutions to flood resilient systems in the urban environment.

Aim

The aim is to improve the Road to Market of innovative Flood Resilient (FRe) technology by reducing deficiencies and obstacles in the implementation of Flood Resilience Measures, facilitating the design of more holistic flood defence systems and supporting the implementation of the new EU flood risk management policy of “Living with Floods”. New technology, systems and tools will be developed. Guidelines for validating their performance will be established and applied in experimental studies to determine the reliability of today’s Flood Resilience products.

Strategy and methodology

The project strategy uses the work package system to address the technology, systems and implementation for flood resilient technology. The three main strands of the research will be brought together through an integration work package. The strategy also involves a significant amount of dissemination activity in order to make an impact. Dissemination activities will be varied to reach a variety of stakeholders and to make an impact from the research results.

Impacts

This project will act as a springboard to the use of the next generation of FRe-technology. Such technology may be based on so called smart systems that incorporate sensor technology, automatic control, innovative materials and high levels of performance. This innovation will improve the effectiveness especially in the case of pluvial and flash floods where extreme short response time requires automatic deployment of FRe-systems. Through involvement of commercial enterprises and service providers it is believed that the research outcomes of this project will be directly applied by the FRe industry and will especially trigger the development of new markets for the protection of urban infrastructure.

The project will result in the development of guidance documents for validating the performance of FRe technology and in experimental studies the reliability of today’s Flood Resilience products.

The project has the potential to make a significant beneficial contribution to flood risk management in Europe and will foster the development of more holistic flood defence systems which will lead in the end to flood resilient cities. The project will substantially reduce the damage, the costs and the health impacts associated with flood hazards.

The selected case studies (Manchester, Hamburg, Dresden, Paris, Valencia, Rotterdam, Athens and in Cyprus) cover various regions of Europe and the coastal regions of the Mediterranean and North Sea. The case studies will be used as instruments for research into systems and the implementation of flood resilient technology.

Partners

The project will be coordinated by Dr. Stephen Garvin, Building Research Establishment (BRE), the partners are:

• Building Research Establishment (BRE), UK

• Centre Scientifique et Technique du Bâtiment, (CSTB), France

• University of Manchester, UK

• University of Athens, Greece

• Dion Toumazis & Associates, Cyprus

• Ecole Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées (ENPC), France

• Technical University of Delft, Netherlands

• Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UMP), Spain

• Leibniz Institute of Ecological and Regional Development (IOER), Germany

National support groups

National Support Groups (NSGs) will be formed in each country. These groups will be composed of representatives of national governments, local government, environment agencies, industry and local flood forums. The intention of the NSG will be to provide support to the project from each country and to represent the interests of the country and industry in the research. The NSGs will effectively have a role to help to steer and advise the project team.

In return the NSG members will have access to the research results at an early stage, in advance of the publication of the findings. In addition, members will have access at reduced rates to dissemination events that will be organised in the UK and on an international basis. The UK NSG represents a substantial opportunity to network with key stakeholders in the field of flood management through regular meetings of the group and virtual networking through a project website.