Adapting to compound flood hazards

Adaptive tools for decisions on compounding climate change impacts on water infrastructure

This project is addressing compounding flood hazards on water infrastructure due to climate change. The research is investigating how flood hazards from rivers, sea-level rise and groundwater will combine either as extreme events (shocks), or as slowly emerging and increasingly persistent impacts.

The research considers whether we can continue to adapt incrementally, or at what point and under which conditions we would need transformational change to cope. Working with researchers from TU Delft in the Netherlands, the team is testing Robust Decision Making (RDM) tools within a Dynamic Adaptive Pathways Planning (DAPP) process.

The goal is to identify what to monitor, in order to understand when a switch from incremental to transformational adaptation may be necessary. The project aims to provide a framework for future infrastructure adaptation, under uncertain climate futures.