Description
The current annual cost of flooding in France and England is around €870m, a figure that is expected to increase by 25-80% by 2100. In addition, projected sea level rise resulting from climate change threatens more than 100,000 buildings in the France (Channel) England area from flooding.
Flood risk management (FRM) is a highly technical public service, traditionally delivered in a top down approach. This approach is hampered by issues such as technical complexity, uncertainty regarding timing and scale of future flooding events and individual and community resistance to change. New approaches to risk management are therefore required which strengthen social cohesion, facilitate ecological transition and adaptation to climate change and support economic recovery at neighbourhood level.
The Building Resilience in Flood Disadvantaged Communities (BRIC) project aims to transform flood risk management service delivery at neighbourhood level, contributing €350m across eight pilot areas and potentially €1.4bn across the Channel area by June 2028. The project will achieve this through the introduction of a new social innovation framework to increase risk awareness, leading to increased preparedness for flooding, along with new service designs for FRM to enable the creation of locally led plans developed by local authorities and citizens.
Image
- Evacuation of flooded Nemours town center. Credit: Arnaud Bouissou / Terra