Small but frequent floods may be responsible for most building replacement costs

Embargoed until: Publicly released: 2021-10-01 10:37

New Zealand

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The rise of global sea levels is expected to cause more extreme flooding, but experts wanted to model what kind of flooding made for costlier fixes to buildings in 20 coastal areas of New Zealand. Was it floods that didn’t happen often but were larger, or more frequent floods that packed less of a punch? When sea levels rose by 0.3m, the team found that the more frequent but smaller floods contributed to more than 80 per cent of the average annual value to replace buildings in half of the areas they studied. NZ’s sea levels are expected to rise by 0.3m in the next 25-50 years, signalling a need for further research.