Interview: How FHIMP is Strengthening Canada’s Flood Resilience Amid Rising Climate Threats

Flooding in Canada causes an average of $1 billion in damages annually, but the summer of 2024 was especially devastating, with over $7 billion in insured losses from floods, fires, and hailstorms. As climate change accelerates, rising sea levels and intensified rainfall could increase flood damage fivefold in the coming decades, potentially reaching $13.6 billion per year by the end of the century. These alarming projections underscore the urgency of implementing effective flood management and mitigation strategies.

In this interview with Marie-Josée Valiquette, Policy Analyst at the Canada Centre for Mapping and Earth Observation (CCMEO), we delve into the vital role of the Flood Hazard Identification and Mapping Program (FHIMP). Launched in 2021, FHIMP has made significant advancements in flood hazard mapping and data acquisition, crucial to enhancing Canada’s resilience against flooding. Valiquette discusses how FHIMP leverages cutting-edge technologies, including AI and machine learning, and collaborates with provinces and territories to bolster flood risk management and climate adaptation across the country.

Can you provide an overview of the key milestones achieved by the Flood Hazard Identification and Mapping Program (FHIMP) since its inception in 2021, especially regarding data acquisition, flood hazard modeling, and map dissemination?

FHIMP was designed to produce and deliver flood data and maps to over 30 high-risk communities and 2,000 km of rivers and coastlines in Canada by 2022-24, making the maps accessible to the public. Since its launch in 2021, NRCan has exceeded this goal by providing data and maps for over 800 communities and 5,000 km of rivers and coastlines.

The first phase of FHIMP, from November 2021 to April 2024, resulted in 20 agreements covering 200 flood mapping-related projects, including data acquisition efforts with provinces and territories. These efforts led to the creation of over 1,000 detailed individual maps.

It’s important to note that public review and engagement require time after the maps are produced. The first flood hazard studies and their corresponding areas will be linked through the federal Canada Flood Map Inventory (CFMI) by fall 2024, with additional maps being added as they become available.

One of FHIMP’s goals is to address gaps in flood hazard knowledge across Canada. How has NRCan identified these gaps, and what progress has been made in updating outdated or incomplete flood data in high-risk areas?

Before FHIMP, the government reached out to all provinces and territories to gather existing flood hazard studies across Canada and create a comprehensive data layer. These flood hazard studies had historically been fragmented, funded by various federal, provincial, regional, and local initiatives, and not all jurisdictions had up-to-date data to share. This resulted in gaps in the existing data, making it challenging to directly compare FHIMP’s progress with earlier flood mapping efforts.

At the program’s outset, FHIMP analyzed the collected flood studies and other variables to prioritize projects. The team estimated that around 950 cities, municipalities, and First Nations reserves were at higher risk of flooding, with over 650 areas lacking current flood hazard maps. NRCan adopted a collaborative co-lead approach, and provincial and territorial priorities were ultimately selected as projects, which sometimes differed from the original analysis.

We are continuing to analyze the progress of updating outdated or incomplete flood data in high-risk areas. While we cannot yet provide a representative figure, there has been measurable progress in advancing flood mapping across Canada especially in high-risk areas.

How is FHIMP making flood hazard maps more accessible and understandable to Canadians, and what steps are being taken to ensure effective communication across different regions?

The cost-shared projects under FHIMP cover the full life cycle of flood hazard map production, including data acquisition, hydrologic and hydraulic analyses, map production, dissemination, and community engagement. Some provinces and territories have updated or launched web platforms and conducted engagement activities to disseminate flood hazard data with FHIMP funds. However, many projects still focus primarily on map production.

Successful FHIMP outreach with key stakeholders and the public include but are not limited to:

• Engaging over 600 flood-mapping stakeholders at events, such as the 2022 Atlantic Flood Mapping Conference where stakeholders shared regional best practices
• Launching flood mapping webpages that convey high level definitions regarding flood mapping,
• Launching a flood mapping data hub as a purpose-built centralized repository for standardized flood mapping related data, informing technical analyses and engineering applications – which includes the Canada Flood Map Inventory where there will be links to access FHIMP maps.

To improve communication around flood maps, NRCan has conducted research to identify gaps and develop further tools. Challenges remain, such as lack of cohesion in language and in communications approaches across the country. A major challenge is the population’s difficulty in accessing and understanding hazard maps that are technical in nature. For example, a flood hazard map does not provide a risk rating which often leads to confusion. NRCan is currently meeting with the provinces and territories to advance a larger communications strategy that would advocate for more consistent language regarding flood mapping across various levels of government so people better understand their use and can find the information they are searching for.

Some provinces and territories have implemented effective communication strategies that have inspired a toolkit NRCan is developing for broader use. This toolkit includes interactive, accessible communication tools for diverse audiences. Additionally, a video prototype for public communication will be shared online by fall.

NRCan has created a draft toolkit and shared it with PTs, which notes a choice of tools that offer interactive, accessible, and attractive communication to cover the widest possible range of audiences.

The NRCan FHIMP team also identified a need to further support and understanding amongst communities that are more vulnerable to flooding, including First Nations communities. FHIMP funding was aimed at cost-shared projects with PTs, and other federal programs (such as the CIRNAC-led First Nation Adapt program) maintain an established mandate and programs that support First Nations communities in flood mapping. Notably, the FHIMP team is improving collaboration amongst these federal departments and communities. Under the second phase of FHIMP there is now a small funding stream dedicated to enhancing Indigenous Traditional Knowledge alongside flood mapping to help increase flood map uptake in Indigenous communities.

Further, preliminary scoping work under FHIMP will help develop the flood risk portal, led by Public Safety Canada, with support from NRCan. They are taking key learnings demonstrated to showcase flood risk in a simple way, with links to other important flood mitigation tools.

How is FHIMP managing the complexities of federal, provincial, and territorial responsibilities in flood risk management, and what role do partnerships play in the successful implementation and dissemination of flood hazard maps?

There are many considerations in creating a program to fill in flood hazard mapping gaps. Jurisdictional complexity lends itself to mixed leadership when it comes to flood management and mapping.

NRCan is aware and would like to emphasize that flood management activities like mapping are largely under the constitutional mandate of provinces and territories, which set their guidelines and policies for flood mapping (e.g. definition of floodway/flood fringe, land-use implications) and may carry out work internally and/or contract it out to industry or delegate flood mapping authority to local administration, or conservation authorities.

However, where waterways cross international or domestic borders or where disaster exceeds the capacity of the provinces and territories to cope with an event, the collection of interoperable flood data to support coordinated management across jurisdictions is more challenging. Additionally, given the increasing frequency and severity of disaster events (and the increased complexity of interacting hazards), the federal government is pulled with growing regularity into disaster response coordination and disaster financial assistance.

There have been many calls for coordinated leadership in overall flood risk management and had been calls for federal leadership to help fill in flood mapping gaps. Even before FHIMP, NRCan maintained leadership in flood mapping by activities like establishing a technical working group on flood mapping that contributes to the Federal Flood Mapping Guidelines Series, which conveys best practices to standardize flood mapping across the country.

Most FHIMP funds are cost-shared with provinces (50-50) and territories (75-25), furthering collaboration between federal and provincial/territorial governments. The respective provinces and territories lead flood mapping projects within their jurisdiction, while the federal government supports, provides guidelines, and ensures consistency in quality. FHIMP success stems from the partnerships that the federal government has been able to create with the provincial/territorial governments.

In addition, FHIMP has engaged with other key stakeholders and funding streams, such as partnering with academia to advance floodplain mapping science. Phase 2 of FHIMP now includes funding streams for regional modeling and Indigenous Traditional Knowledge collaboration.

In recent years, NRCan’s Canada Centre for Mapping and Earth Observation has been leveraging GeoAI for creating geospatial data. For example, a team under Dr. Heather McGrath created the flood susceptibility index (FSI) which is a national map of flood-prone areas based on patterns of historic flood events, predicted by a machine learning model. The government and other organizations are using the most recent version of the FSI and their research to enhance their modeling.

NRCan is primarily cost-sharing the creation of detailed engineering maps or flood hazard maps. Accuracy and confidence increase with a detailed engineered flood hazard map, but these maps take time and money and cannot feasibly be applied throughout all of Canada. As such, research can focus on a mechanism to automatically update regional modeling to fill in gaps for areas where an updated flood hazard map is too cost-prohibitive.

Under our expanded program, we have funds set aside for research for examples of regional or water-shed scale modeling and innovation. The government hopes to follow provincial leadership and see more examples like Quebec’s INFO-Crue to try to fill in flood hazard gaps. Another example is in Prince Edward Island where FHIMP partially funded CHRIS. Information from regional modeling can be used for decision-making purposes and help governments set priorities for more detailed mapping activities.

Additionally, Environment and Climate Change Canada is funding research to better incorporate climate change considerations into flood mapping. NRCan is working with provinces and territories to include various modeling scenarios to account for climate impacts.

Flood hazard mapping plays a key role in improving climate resilience. For flood maps, we require sustainable update mechanisms to reflect changing natural landscapes and structural changes, urban development, changes in water flow levels, or climate change impacts. Our program emphasizes the need to disseminate accessible information that would help inform Canadians and support an effective and proactive plan for flood risk management in Canada.