The Stormwater Report

On June 3, as reported by Bloomberg BNA, Illinois Farmers Insurance Co. voluntarily dismissed six class action lawsuits against 200 Northern Illinois municipalities in Cook, DuPage, Kane, McHenry, Will and Lake counties. The lawsuits claimed that entities, such as the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago, were responsible for more than 600 flood insurance […]

For 21 years, the New York City Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) has administered its watershed protection program. The program allows the city to avoid filtration and makes it the largest unfiltered water supply in the nation, serving more than 9 million New Yorkers. In early May, the state health department approved revisions to New […]

Learning from experience, Fairfax County stormwater engineers have identified 11 lessons that are important to the success of any flood response program.

Increases in storm surge and sea level rise have increased the chances of water overtopping the Manhattan sea wall at least 20-fold compared to 170 years ago, according to a new study. Using old records, Portland State University and Stevens Institute of Technology researchers found that maximum water levels in New York harbor during major […]

According to a new report — Cities Alive – rethinking green infrastructure — the natural environment should be a primary concern in urban development, and one that is considered from the earliest planning stages. Generated by London-based firm Arup and supported by the Landscape Institute and Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew, the report addresses global issues, […]

A team of researchers at the College of William & Mary’s Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS), accurately hindcasted Hurricane Sandy’s landfall along the U.S. Atlantic coast using a large-scale, unstructured grid storm tide model, called Semi-implicit Eulerian Lagrangian Finite Element. The researchers used data collected before Hurricane Sandy and tested the results with observations […]

On March 14, the Government of the Alberta announced a commitment of $1 billion (CAD$1.1 billion) over the next three years to flood-recovery.  Nearly $120 million (CAD$132 million) will be available for flood mitigation, floodway relocation, erosion control grants, and flood hazard studies and updating flood maps. The amount also includes $8.9 million (CAD$9.7 million) […]

On Feb. 12, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report on extreme weather events and how the Federal government can limit its financial risk, especially in light of climate change. According to the report, the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP), managed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), creates significant “fiscal exposure.” In 2012, […]

President Barack Obama announced his 2015 budget on March 4, calling for a $1 billion climate resilience fund. The fund would support adaptation efforts as well as research and technology that improves community preparedness for extreme weather events, such as drought and flooding. According to the White House, the $1 billion price tag is small […]

Canada’s insured loss totaled $3.2 billion (US$2.88 billion) in 2013, the highest in the country’s history, reports the Insurance Bureau of Canada (IBC). The losses of 2013 came after four consecutive years of natural disaster losses for the insurance industry that hit the $1 billion (US$900 million) mark. The largest insured disaster – and Canada’s […]