According to Bodoque, it is also necessary to improve flood risk mapping. It is necessary to characterize vulnerability comprehensively, which implies considering the social, economic, physical, institutional and cultural dimensions of what makes a community vulnerable to climate. It is necessary to understand all the components that increase people’s risk: not only their exposure to extreme weather conditions, but also how sensitive they are to them and how resilient they are. Bodoque’s own research has found that most literature on vulnerability to natural disasters generally considers only two dimensions: social and economic, neglecting the institutional and cultural qualities of regions.
Regarding the challenges of integrating the mapping of flood zones into regional decision-making, Bodoque points out that in the European Union there is a regulatory framework that includes a preliminary assessment of flood risk, as well as hazard maps in which You must calculate the risk according to the population and exposed assets. “There is a lot of room for improvement; “Flood hazard maps present a lot of uncertainty.” In part, he explains, this is because flooding is a random process. It is very likely that where an intense flood has already occurred, another one will occur later, but it is not possible to know whether it will happen in five or 300 years.
In addition to this, Bodoque explains, there is another issue. The parameters that feed the risk maps are not fixed values, but ranges; You can enter upper, middle or lower values, as desired. However, the maps used in Spain and many other countries are deterministic; That is, they indicate only flood-prone and non-flood-prone areas. In other words, they only see black and white. “I am providing a single cartographic result, when for each of the parameters and for the range I have infinite results,” says Bodoque. Uncertainty is reduced to a deterministic map which can then create a false sense of security.
It is necessary, says Bodoque, to change this method of generating maps that represent risk probabilities in flood-prone areas. This approach would better reflect the uncertainty inherent in flooding. However, this probabilistic model entails a high computational cost.
To better address the risks associated with torrential rains, Bodoque highlights the importance of raising awareness among the population about the danger they face. In Spain, he and his colleagues have found that people exposed to natural climate processes do not perceive that they are at risk, in part because extreme climate events do not occur every year.
This low perception of risk has deadly consequences, as it encourages reckless decisions in risky situations. Faced with this, Bodoque suggests developing communication plans for different audiences. in a article Published in the Journal of Hydrology, of which he is co-author, Bodoque indicates that while “risk management based on a technocratic approach can give people a false sense of security”, the implementation of a good risk communication strategy would facilitate a better answer. to emergency alerts.
This story originally appeared on WIRED in Spanish and has been translated from Spanish.