event
Tuesday 25 Mar 2014: A Modelling Approach for the Identification and Mitigation of Pluvial Urban Flooding
Professor Bryan Ellis - Middlesex University
Harrison room 170 14:00-15:00
Surface water (or pluvial) urban flooding accounts for about one-third of all flood risks in the UK and with 2.5 – 3.0M people exposed to an annual flood risk of 0.5% (1:200 RI storm event). It is estimated that adequate flood defense works to safeguard against this risk level will cost over £1.5B over the next 30 – 40 years. The principal focus of UK flood risk management policy is to identify and quantify “hotspot” flooding within the urbanised area in terms of water depths, flow paths and the spatial/temporal distribution of surface flooding for “critical drainage areas”. The presentation will examine the role and application of coupled 1D-2D modelling approaches in identifying and quantifying flood risk in such critical drainage areas. The relative efficiencies of aerial and terrestrial LiDAR surveys in representing microtopographic detail will be evaluated in terms of accurate flood depth and distribution mapping. A further coupled model (SUDSLOC) will be demonstrated which provides a generic basis for the selection and siting of appropriate sustainable drainage systems (SUDS) for mitigating flood and pollution damage. The presentation will conclude with some perspectives on the political and organisational issues associated with pluvial flood risk management and arising from the requirements of the EU WFD and Floods Directives.
About the speaker:
Bryan Ellis is Emeritus Professor at the Urban Pollution Research Centre at Middlesex University, London. He has been involved in urban drainage for over 40 years and has some 260 publications covering surface water sewers, ecotoxicology and water quality of urban receiving waters, sewer exfiltration and misconnections, flood risk modelling and SUDS drainage controls. He has served as both Member and Chair of the IWA/IAHR International Joint Committee for Urban Drainage and is a current member of the Defra/EA Joint Working Party on Non-Agricultural Diffuse Pollution and the Defra/EA Highway Outfalls Joint Committee.
