Holistic Flood Management under Climate Impacts

Municipalities and utilities are facing unprecedented challenges in planning for extreme precipitation and flooding events, which are occurring more frequently and unpredictably. A holistic approach to flood management and modeling, including partnerships among stakeholders, is needed to better balance competing management objectives while minimizing overall system vulnerabilities in a changing climate.

This webcast provided an overview of the WRF project Holistic and Innovative Approaches for Flood Mitigation Planning and Modeling under Extreme Wet Weather Events and Climate Impacts (5084), including utility case studies and preliminary research findings. The City of Calgary (Canada), along with Water Utility Climate Alliance utility network members from New York City and San Francisco, discussed how holistic flood management and modeling approaches have been used in their municipalities, incorporating consideration of climate change impacts. The project results can be applied by utilities and municipalities of all sizes to incorporate climate variability and uncertainty into their holistic flood management and modeling practices.

Presenters:

• Eric Hersh, PhD, PE, Senior Water Resources Engineer, Stantec

• Andrew Verdin, PhD, Hydrologic Scientist, Stantec

• Mark S. Bartlett, PhD, PE, Engineering Insight & Analytics Technical Lead, Stantec; and Data Science and ML Practice Lead, The Water Institute of the Gulf

• Pinar Balci, PhD, Assistant Commissioner, New York City Department of Environmental Protection

• Sarah Minick, Utility Planning Manager, San Francisco Public Utilities Commission

• Frank Frigo, PEng, Acting Manager, Climate & Environment, City of Calgary, Canada

Moderator:

• Harry Zhang, PhD, PE, Research Program Manager, The Water Research Foundation