Research Concept
The main aim of the LIMIT2ADAPT project is to achieve a quantitative understanding of the limits of adaptation to future flood risk given changing patterns of social and physical vulnerability of households and their interactions with other stakeholders in riverine areas at the global scale. This includes the following:
To understand and simulate how changes in social and physical vulnerability affect global flood risk and adaptation decisions that may lead to adaptation limits; and to assess how household adaptation is stimulated or limited by government and insurance adaptation.
To assess how and why social and physical vulnerability change over time and space; identify which social vulnerability constraints influence household adaptation decisions and ascertain how adaptation affects physical vulnerability of buildings, and ultimately adaptation limits.
To quantify where and when future global adaptation limits occur; map social vulnerability hotspots; and synthesize results into a new theory on risk assessment and adaptation limits.
Therefore, we will develop a global model for simulating flood adaption limits by integrating two state-of-the-art methods, i.e., flood risk- and agent-based models. We will use the new model to simulate historical time series of social and physical vulnerability for four selected river basins, using exposure-, survey- and census data. We will also simulate global projections of vulnerability hotspots and flood risk. These projections will allow the first spatial-temporal simulation of future adaptation limits at the global scale. Discovering where and when limits occur, and how these are shaped by vulnerability dynamics will lead to a new theory on risk assessment and adaptation limits that sets the scene for future research and policy on climate adaptation.
