UK flood defences

The Association of British Insurers (ABI) has called on the UK Government to bring forward its spending plans on vital flood defences. It says that speeding up this spending would stimulate the economy and protect more homes.

Following the devastating floods of 2007, the Government agreed to spend £1.5 billion on flood defences between 2009 and 2011. The ABI argues that by bringing that spending forward, the Government could help boost expenditure projects to the benefit of the wider economy.

The ABI is also working closely with the Government to develop a long term flood management strategy, which looks at funding needs 25–30 years ahead, and regional planning, taking into account the likely impact of climate change in 50 and 100 years time.

The insurance industry dealt with over 180,000 claims as a result of the flooding in 2007, with the total bill at around £3 billion.

• Catastrophe modeller AIR Worldwide has launched a new probabilistic model for UK inland flood for properties in England, Wales and Scotland. It captures storm systems of varying size — from large scale events affecting the entire country to local thunderstorms. The financial component covers residential and commercial lines of business, including alternative living expenses and business interruption.

AIR says that using results from numerical weather prediction (NWP) modelling, it has developed an innovative and sophisticated rainfall generation module that produces a realistic simulation of rainfall patterns that account for storm duration and the geographic area of rainfall.

www.air-worldwide.com