Technologies for the cost-effective Flood Protection of the Built Environment (FLOODPROBE)

The principal aim of FloodProBE is to provide cost-effective means for the flood protection and damage mitigation in urban areas. To this end, FloodProBE has developed, tested and disseminated technologies, methods, concepts and tools for risk assessment and mitigation, focussing particularly on the adaptation of new and existing buildings (retrofitting) and on infrastructure networks. The three main elements addressed by FloodProBE were:

• the vulnerability of critical infrastructure and high-density value assets, being the main originators of direct and indirect flood damage,
• the reliability of urban flood defences by improving understanding and assessment of failure processes that have proven to be critical in recent flood events
• construction technologies and concepts for flood-proofing buildings and infrastructure networks to increase the flood-resilience of the urban system as well as for retrofit and repair of flood defences in the most economic and cost beneficial manner.

The afore-mentioned elements have been integrated into state-of-the-art flood risk management strategies and have been developed, tested and validated via pilot study sites. A wide range of stakeholders have been involved in the project from the outset through an Associate Partner programme and by an external Advisory Board. This involvement has provided guidance on the project programme to directly meet industry needs, whilst also facilitating international dissemination, supporting uptake and implementation of project deliverables. The primary impact of FloodProBE has been a significant increase in the cost-effectiveness (i.e. performance) of investments in newly developed and existing flood protection and flood resilience measures. This has been achieved by focusing the research on risk hotspots , i.e. weak links in flood defence system performance and vulnerable assets, that, if damaged, cause very large direct and indirect adverse consequences (e.g. infrastructure networks).