| Popis: |
Worldwide, communities are facing increasing flood risk, due to more frequent and intense hazards and rising exposure through more people living along coastlines and in flood plains. Nature-based Solutions (NbS), such as mangroves, and riparian forests, offer huge potential for adaptation and risk reduction. The capacity of trees and forests to attenuate waves and mitigate storm damages receives massive attention, especially after extreme storm events. However, application of forests in flood mitigation strategies remains limited to date, due to lack of real-scale measurements on the performance under extreme conditions. Experiments executed in a large-scale flume with a willow forest to dissipate waves show that trees are hardly damaged and strongly reduce wave and run-up heights, even when maximum wave heights are up to 2.5 meters. It was observed for the first time that the surface area of the tree canopy is most relevant for wave attenuation, but that the very flexible leaves hardly add to effectiveness. Overall, the study shows that forests can play a significant role in reducing wave heights and run-up under extreme conditions. Currently, this potential is hardly used but may result in considerable cost savings in levee designs. |
