Research: Natural Flood Management evidence

Summaries of our latest evidence on natural flood management (NFM)

This page contains the summaries for the 2024 Working with natural processes evidence directory.

The research report and literature review can be found on the research project page.

Working with natural processes (WWNP) aims to protect, restore and emulate the natural functions of catchments, floodplains, rivers and the coast to reduce flood risk. It is also referred to as natural flood management (NFM).

WWNP takes many different forms. It can be applied in urban and rural areas, and on rivers, estuaries and coasts. Measures can be stand-alone or in combination with traditional engineered structures.

We published the Working with natural processes evidence directory in 2017. Since then, researchers have learned more about WWNP measures, their effectiveness in reducing flood risk and providing wider benefits.

We reviewed research from 2017 to 2023 and produced an update to the evidence directory. The update allows practitioners to access recent information on WWNP measures.

In the summaries above, we provide an overview of the evidence around WWNP measures.

We cover 17 individual measures that are grouped into 4 categories.

We added 3 new WWNP measures to this update because there was an increase in scientific studies in a UK context since 2017.

We summarised the benefits for each WWNP measure using 8 indicators. The categorisation of these benefits changed since 2017 to reflect Defra’s Enabling a Natural Capital Approach (ENCA). In these summaries, flood risk reduction is used instead of flood regulation.

Social – flood risk reduction, water resources, air quality  

Environmental – biodiversity, soil, climate regulation, water quality