Climate change and peak river flows

Research provided vital information for planners, developers, and flood risk management authorities to prepare for future flooding scenarios. 

Climate change impacts on peak river flows

Alison L Kay 1, Ali Rudd 1, Matthew Fry 1, Gemma Nash 2 and Stuart Allen 3

1 UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, Wallingford, United Kingdom

2 UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, Edinburgh, United Kingdom

The Climate change and fluvial flood peaks research investigated how climate change affects fluvial flood peaks. The evidence is used to support sustainable development and investment in flood and coastal risk mitigation actions. The research spanned from 2018 to 2021 and was published in 2023.

The research builds on past projects. In 2010, the early uplifts were assessed in the Regionalised impacts of climate change on flood flows, which used selected local hydrological models within a sensitivity framework. The hazard was regionalised using UK climate projections (UKCP09) in Practicalities for implementing regionalised allowances for climate change on flood flows. However, in this earlier research, the information on the impact of flooding relied on old climate projections and was based on modelling a limited number of locations.