Natural measures to prevent floods are not a ’silver bullet’ solution

Oxford Martin School research says claims that natural flood management can improve the worst floods are not supported by scientific evidence. Their research in the Proceedings of the Royal Society A concludes that natural measures to manage flooding from rivers can play a valuable role in flood prevention. However, a lack of monitoring means their true potential remains unclear. Measures such as river restoration and tree planting aim to restore processes that have been affected by human activities like farming, land management and house-building. Natural flood management is an area of increasing interest for policy makers, but its implementation can present a complex balancing act between the needs of different groups, including the public, farmers and land owners. Mixed messages about their effectiveness and the scale needed to implement natural flood management measures successfully add to the uncertainty surrounding their benefits. Now a team of experts, led by Dr Simon Dadson of the School of Geography and the Environment at the University of Oxford, has compiled evidence on natural flood management to inform policy decision-making and show where there are still crucial gaps in knowledge. The article shines a light on the scientific evidence available from a variety of sources, ranging from field data to model projections and expert opinion. One of the main problems that decision-makers face is that differences between catchments make it difficult to transfer evidence from one location to the other.