The Levee Safety Partnership

The Levee Safety Partnership brings together experts from 3 countries to focus on emerging challenges and opportunities in flood defence infrastructure assets.

Environment Agency (United Kingdom), Rijkswaterstaat (the Netherlands) and the United States Army Corp of Engineers (United States of America)

The Levee Safety Partnership (LSP) is a collaboration uniting engineers and researchers from the Netherlands, the USA, and the UK. It was established after Hurricane Katrina in 2004, when the United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) sought expertise from Rijkswaterstaat in the Netherlands to enhance levee safety risk management. In 2014, the Environment Agency joined the partnership.

The Environment Agency has Memorandums of Understanding (MoU) in place with both organisations, underpinned by mutual agreement. The purpose of the MoUs is the sharing of common technical interests, and to cooperate in the development of joint activities in the field of Integrated Water Resources Management. To support this, participants exchange scientific and technical information, participate in visits and staff exchanges, run a community of practice, seminars and workshops and share best practices and lessons learned.

In 2024 and 2025, the research focused on surface protection specifically improving resilience and biodiversity in both vegetation and soils. This led to a collated evidence base to support improvements in seed mix, where further trials are intended before adapting current practice.

Across 2023 and 2024 workshops helped to improve understanding on backwards erosion piping. Engagement with the International Handbook on Emergency Management for Flood Defences has led to further research to improve the evidence base behind options for emergency response to asset failure.