Quantifying the effects of nature-based solutions in reducing risks from hydrometeorological hazards: examples from Europe

Mohammad Aminur Rahman Shah, Jiren Xu, Francesca Carisi, Francesco De Paola, Silvana Di Sabatino, Alessio Domeneghetti, Carlo Gerundo, Alejandro Gonzalez-Ollauri, Farrokh Nadim, Natasha Petruccelli, Annemarie Polderman, Francesco Pugliese, Beatrice Pulvirenti, Paolo Ruggieri, Giuseppe Speranza, Elena Toth, Thomas Zieher, Fabrice G. Renaud*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

3 Citations (Scopus)
128 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

The combination of climate change and social and ecological factors will increase risks societies face from hydrometeorological hazards (HMH). Reducing these risks is typically achieved through the deployment of engineered (or grey) infrastructure but increasingly, nature-based solutions (NBS) are being considered. Most risk assessment frameworks do not allow capturing well the role NBS can play in addressing all components of risk, i.e., the hazard characteristics and the exposure and vulnerability of social-ecological systems. Recently, the Vulnerability and Risk assessment framework developed to allow the assessment of risks in the context of NBS implementation (VR-NBS framework) was proposed. Here, we carry out the first implementation of this framework using five case study areas in Europe which are exposed to various HMH. Our results show that we can demonstrate the effect NBS have in terms of risk reduction and that this can be achieved by using a flexible library of indicators that allows to capture the specificities of each case study hazard, social and ecological circumstances. The approach appears to be more effective for larger case study areas, but further testing is required in a broader variety of contexts.
Original languageEnglish
Article number103771
Number of pages24
Journal International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction
Volume93
Early online date14 Jun 2023
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Jul 2023

Keywords

  • Hydrometeorological hazards
  • Nature-based solutions
  • Risk assessment
  • Social-ecological systems
  • Scenarios
  • OPERANDUM
  • PHUSICOS

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Geology
  • Geotechnical Engineering and Engineering Geology
  • Safety Research

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