Estimating the benefits of natural flood management
This project proposes a new simplified national-scale approach to estimate the economic benefits of natural flood management projects.
Documents
Summary
Natural flood management (NFM) comprises a range of nature-based solutions aimed at restoring natural hydrological processes to manage flood and coastal erosion risk.
These measures include:
- woodland planting
- leaky barriers
- floodplain reconnection
- run-off attenuation
- peatland restoration
Many NFM projects are low-cost and led by communities. However, they often face challenges in securing funding. This is because traditional modelling methods used to estimate economic benefits can be expensive and complex.聽This new approach aims to address this by demonstrating a proportionate and consistent approach to estimating the economic benefits of NFM projects.
The method draws directly on the best available evidence and latest scientific understanding and allows for future refinement as new data and monitoring evidence become available.
It incorporates new insights from:
- the updated Working with natural processes (WWNP) evidence directory
- the
- the Environment Agency鈥檚 latest National Flood Risk Assessment (NaFRA) which provides information on flood risk and associated flood damages
- the Environment and Historic Environment Outcomes Valuation (EHOV-Lite) tool to estimate environmental benefits
Project Information
Project manager: Daniel Hine
This project was commissioned by the Environment Agency鈥檚 FCRM Directorate, as part of the joint Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management Research and Development Programme.