Title:  "Robust Mitigation of Future Flood Risk Using the Coastal Louisiana Risk Assessment Model"

Presented by: David Johnson, RAND Corporation

Abstract:
In May 2012, Louisiana unanimously approved its $50 billion Comprehensive Master Plan for a Sustainable Coast, designed to reduce flood risk and prevent land loss while minimizing any negative impacts on ecosystem services. The Coastal Louisiana Risk Assessment model (CLARA) was developed to evaluate the impact of hundreds of potential flood risk reduction projects, each considered against a variety of environmental, economic, and operational uncertainties. It combines the strengths of other post-Katrina studies of Louisiana flood risk and is an example of the type of modern risk analysis recommended in the National Academies' recent report on modernization of the National Flood Insurance Program.

This talk describes CLARA's capabilities and potential by illustrating how it has been used for robust decision-making support during the Master Plan process and, subsequently, for optimization within scenarios. Its flexible design allows planners to estimate the consequences of individual storms, to explore how the entire distribution of risk changes under different future climate change outcomes, and to facilitate the development of adaptive strategies that cost-effectively mitigate risk from storm surge flooding.