One in four UK properties are at risk of flood according to new analysis from JBA Risk Management.
The flood specialist’s new UK Flood Model, launched this week, also highlights an estimated annual cost of £527m to UK residential properties from flood, a figure that rises to £1.9bn without flood defences.
The analysis follows the launch of JBA Risk Management’s new UK Flood Model, which now uses the company’s FLY Technology, enabling the insurance market to build models quickly at run time rather than from traditional pre-compiled parameters.
This brings unprecedented customisation and flexibility, which combined with 5m resolution maps, enables re/insurers to assess flood risk to individual properties for effective risk pricing, portfolio management, and to avoid over or underinsurance.
The new UK Flood Model shows that flood defences could reduce losses by an estimated 360% across river, surface water and coastal flooding, with coastal flooding up to 1300% higher without coastal flood defences.
Losses from river flood are reduced by an estimated 295% from river flood defences. The data also shows that property level protection has the potential to make a huge difference – raising individual property defences for all residential properties in the UK could potentially reduce losses by half.
The largest estimated annual average losses for residential properties are seen in the Hull postcode area (6% of total estimated UK losses) followed by Bristol, Glasgow, Twickenham, and Slough. Other high loss postcode districts occur in and around the Thames.
Nikki Pilgrim, technical director, JBA Risk Management commented: “The data, and recent flood events around the world, are a clear warning that flood remains a pervasive risk that must be taken seriously.
“Our new UK Flood Model’s enhanced functionality enables the insurance market to fully understand their flood exposure – users can easily, and quickly, undertake ‘what if’ investigations based on their own needs, see the impacts on their losses, and fully understand individual and portfolio risk profiles.”
Gary McInally, chief actuary, Flood Re welcomed the new model: “I am pleased to see firms like JBA continue to invest in their flood data and modelling.
“Flooding presents a significant risk to the UK and is changing as a consequence of climate change, developing in complex ways that could have materially varying impacts across different communities in the UK.
“The changing climate means that access to up to date and detailed data will become increasingly important as organisations seek to effectively quantify and own their view of flood risk.
“High-quality, flexible models have a major role to play in building the understanding of that risk to inform risk management today and the building of resilience for tomorrow.”
