Flood risk, flood prevention and flood insurance in The Netherlands

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Flood risk, flood prevention and flood insurance
in The Netherlands

• Karel Heynert Laurens Bouwer
• Deltares, The Netherlands

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This talk
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(No Transcript)
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The Netherlands - delta of 4 international basins
Amsterdam
Schiphol
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The Netherlands protected by levees
Total Vulnerable to flooding
Surface Area  41.528 km² 55
Inhabitants 16,8 million 60
GNP 700 billion 65
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(No Transcript)
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Flood protection in The Netherlands (current)
Return periods
4,000yr

• 53 flood protection areas (dike rings)
• Protection level based on probability of
  exceedance of design waterlevels
• 5 different protection standards
• Procedure in Water Act
• Formal verification every 6 yrs

1,250yr
10,000yr
4,000yr
2,000yr
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Towards a flood risk based approach

• Decision making based on flood risk
• Still largely an engineering approach, but
• Flood risk
• Unprotected areas flood hazard vulnerability
  (mapping)
• Areas with flood defences failure probability
  consequences (calculations)
• Rationale for investments in flood defences
• Economic viability
• Probability of loss of life lt 10-5

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Computing flood risk
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Computing flood risk
Potential inundation depth in (meter)

• Some points of attention
• Indirect damage
• Critical infrastructure
• Not all parts of levee system are equally
  important
• Flood protection units interact

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Potential loss of life

• Preventing loss of life
• Flood protection
• Flood warning crisis management

28 oktober 2015
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Flood insurance
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Insurability of flood damage in The Netherlands
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• Local flood damage ? ordinary insurance policies
• 1 Water damage in house (rain)
• 2 High groundwater
• 3 Sewer flooding
• 4 Polder water system

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Insurability of flood damage in The Netherlands
X

• Local flood damage ? ordinary insurance policies
• 1 Water damage in house (rain)
• 2 High groundwater
• 3 Sewer flooding
• 4 Polder water system

Flooding, due to failure of defences ? coverage
?? 5 Failure regional flood defence 6 Failure
of primary flood defence 7 Unembanked areas
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Flood insurance in The Netherlands

• Building and home content policies
• Crop loss insurance stopped in 09
• Government compensation act (WTS)
• New disaster insurance
• Flooding, terrorism, earthquake etc
• Limited to 75 k per insured object
• Limit in nr of households in unit
• Flood insurance pool proposed by Dutch
  Association of Insurers
• Obligatory, incl. in house insurance!
• Annual max. coverage 5,000 M
• Seems rejected by NL cartel authority

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Future direction of flood insurance?

• Flood risk management policy based on
• Prevention
• Optimal investments
• Prevention of loss of life
• High protection levels
• Infrequent events
• High accumulation risk
• Limited flood awareness (?)
• Public anticipation of role government
• So where should we with flood insurance?
• Mainly for regional water systems?

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• How to balance between
• investments in flood protection and
• relying on flood insurance?
• Thank you!