The assessment belongs to the Environment Agency

Jun 19, 2009 20:01 GMT  ·  By
The existing levee system in the UK could soon be overwhelmed by larger amounts of water, from both rivers and rain
   The existing levee system in the UK could soon be overwhelmed by larger amounts of water, from both rivers and rain

According to the latest numbers released by the UK Environment Agency, more than one sixth of British homes are at risk of floods, and existing measures to stop that may not do too great of a job in stopping it from happening. Additionally, the report says, global warming and climate change may significantly raise the number of households prone to disaster in just a few years, so the existing defenses need to be upgraded, or at least doubled, the documents further state.

The EA argues that funding for flooding infrastructure needs to be boosted to about one billion pounds ($1.65 billion) per year until 2035, if the country is to have any chance of averting large-scale and widespread disaster. If no steps are taken to address this issue, then the national agency believes that flooding caused by various factors could bring about, on average, more than four billion pounds worth of damage ($6.6 billion) each year, in the same time frame.

“The latest UK climate change data shows that the risk of flooding and coastal erosion will continue to increase in future due to rising sea levels and more frequent and heavy storms. There are important decisions for us all to take about how to manage these risks to protect people, communities, businesses and the economy in future,” the EA Chairman, Chris Smith, said, quoted by the BBC News. The new study uses information gathered from the government's projections of climate change effects in the nation, which were published on Thursday.

According to the UKCP09 projections, by 2080, every area in the UK could receive by as much as 20 percent more rainwater on its surface than it does now. This means that the volume of some rivers could increase by the same percentage, which would render a large part of the existing levee and dam systems useless. Additionally, the 20 percent increase will be just the norm a few decades from now. If more rain falls at the time, then waters could swell by 30 or 40 percent more from today's levels, putting homes further at risk of flooding and devastation.