A conceptual workflow for projecting future riverine and coastal flood hazards to support the federal flood risk management standard

Abstract

In 2021, the reinstatement of the Federal Flood Risk Management Standard (FFRMS) required federally funded projects to recognize potential increases in flood hazards over their service lives due to climate change or local anthropogenic perturbations. Recognizing that the state of the science had advanced since the implementation guidelines for this standard were published in 2015 (WRC, 2015, Appendix H), an interagency state-of-the-science review committee conceptualized a workflow to guide the mapping and risk communication of projected future flood hazards in both riverine and coastal settings. This five-element workflow connects climate, hydrologic, and hydraulic models, incorporates land and water management impacts and ongoing geomorphic changes, and can be tailored to the unique nature of different agency needs and resources. These conceptual workflows also provide a basis for a Climate-Informed Science Approach (CISA) implementation roadmap that identifies incremental steps for addressing the research and data gaps elucidated in our review. Many of these incremental steps present opportunities for interagency collaboration that would facilitate the rollout of the FFRMS in diverse riverine and coastal settings of the United States. We conduct case-study thought experiments to evaluate the implementation of the riverine and coastal workflows at three different locations in the United States: central Indiana, Galveston, Texas, and a small coastal community in western Alaska (Shaktoolik). Our thought experiments consider different project horizons, data availability, failure consequences, technical training requirements, and computational resources.