Climate Adaptation, Floods and Resilience: Scientific support of the reconstruction processes following the flood disaster in Rhineland-Palatinate and North Rhine-Westphalia | KAHR
![[Translate to English:] Foto: Christian, Adobe Stock](/fileadmin/_processed_/a/b/csm_Bild1_4f0cc13154.jpg)
The floods in North Rhine-Westphalia and Rhineland-Palatinate in July 2021, which caused more than 180 deaths and economic losses of over 30 billion euros, are among the most damaging disasters in Germany since 1945. The aim of the BMBF joint project KAHR is to scientifically support the reconstruction and thus make the affected regions more resilient.
The GFZ is one of 13 partners from science and practice. Together with local stakeholders, we are working on the development, evaluation and implementation of protection, prevention and planning concepts to strengthen resilience by combining water management, spatial planning, urban planning and social science expertise.
The GFZ is responsible for work package 2: ‘Flood modelling Rhineland-Palatinate and North Rhine-Westphalia’. We are developing a modelling system to assess flood hazard and risk for several catchments in Rhineland-Palatinate and North Rhine-Westphalia. We use this tool to quantify the current risk and develop extreme scenarios in order to understand the vulnerability and weak points of risk management in the form of stress tests. Using a novel approach in the form of a transient weather generator, we create projections for extreme precipitation and flood runoff under climate change. This information serves as a basis for the discussion on climate-resilient reconstruction.
Link to:hochwasser-kahr.de
Inundation areas of the flood in July 2021 in the Ahr valley: The simulation (blue areas) matches the reconstructed areas (green outlines) very well. Red dots show flood marks that were used for the reconstruction.
Areas with a high risk of drowning (violet areas) due to fast-flowing water and/or high water levels.
Publication:
Vorogushyn, S., Han, L., Apel, H., Nguyen, V. D., Guse, B., Guan, X., Rakovec, O., Najafi, H., Samaniego, L., and Merz, B. (2024): It could have been much worse: spatial counterfactuals of the July 2021 flood in the Ahr valley, Germany, Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss. [preprint], doi.org/10.5194/nhess-2024-97, in review.
Merz, B., Nguyen, V. D., Guse, B., Han, L., Guan, X., Rakovec, O., Samaniego, L., Ahrens, B., & Vorogushyn, S. (2024). Spatial counterfactuals to explore disastrous flooding. Environmental Research Letters, 19, 044022. doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ad22b9
Apel, H., Vorogushyn, S., & Merz, B. (2022). Brief communication: Impact forecasting could substantially improve the emergency management of deadly floods: case study July 2021 floods in Germany. Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences, 22(9). doi.org/10.5194/nhess-22-3005-2022
Vorogushyn, S., Apel, H., Kemter, M., & Thieken, A. H. (2022). Analyse der Hochwassergefährdung im Ahrtal unter Berücksichtigung historischer Hochwasser. Hydrologie Und Wasserbewirtschaftung, 66(5), 244–254. doi.org/10.5675/HyWa_2022.5_2
