According to Bodok, we also need to improve flood-risk mapping. Vulnerability needs to be characterized holistically, which means considering the social, economic, physical, institutional and cultural dimensions that make a community vulnerable to climate. It is essential to understand all the factors that increase people's risk: not only their exposure to extreme weather, but how sensitive they are to it, and how resilient they are. Bodok's own research has found that most literature on vulnerability to natural disasters typically considers only two dimensions – social and economic – neglecting the institutional and cultural qualities of regions.
As for the challenges of integrating flood-prone area mapping into regional decision making, Bodok points out that the EU has a regulatory framework that includes preliminary flood risk assessments, as well as hazard maps in which risks must be calculated accordingly. Population and exposed assets. “There is a lot of room for improvement; Flood risk maps show a lot of uncertainty.'' He explains that this is partly because floods are a random process. It is very likely that where an intense flood has already occurred, another flood will occur later, but it is not possible to know whether it will happen in five or 300 years.
Plus, Bodock points out, there's another issue. The parameters that feed the risk maps are not fixed values, but ranges – you can feed in upper, middle or lower values as desired. Yet the maps used in Spain and many other countries are deterministic; That is, they show only floodable and non-floodable areas. In other words, they only see black and white. “I'm providing a single cartographic output, whereas I have infinite outputs for each parameter and range,” Bodock says. Uncertainty is flattened into a deterministic map which can then create a false sense of security.
Bodok says it is necessary to change this method of preparing maps showing the probability of risk in flood-prone areas. This approach would better reflect the uncertainty inherent in flood events. However, this probabilistic model involves high computational cost.
To better address the risks associated with torrential rains, Bodok stressed the importance of making the population aware of the danger they face. In Spain, he and his colleagues have found that people exposed to natural weather processes do not realize they are at risk, partly because extreme weather events do not occur every year.
This low perception of risk has deleterious consequences, as it encourages imprudent decisions in risky situations. In contrast, Bodock suggests developing communication plans for different audiences. in one Article Published in the Journal of Hydrology, which he co-authored, Bodock points out that while “risk management based on technical approaches can give people a false sense of security,” implementation of a good risk-communication strategy will facilitate better response to emergency alerts. For.
This story was originally published on Wired in Español And it has been translated from Spanish.