Liang et al. (2026) Height-aware and protection-informed flood assessment shifts global urban risk distribution

Identification

• Journal: Scientific Reports
• Year: 2026
• Date: 2026-09-17
• Authors: Jiayong Liang, Imaan Hilaly, Xuyan Gao, ChengHe Guan, Ying Li, Kangning Huang
• DOI: 10.1038/s41598-026-70981-w

Research Groups

• Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of California, Berkeley
• Institute for Risk and Uncertainty, University of Liverpool
• National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), Boulder, Colorado
• World Meteorological Organization (WMO)

Short Summary

This study introduces a comprehensive framework that integrates flood depth, building height, and protection standards across multiple scales to improve global urban flood risk assessments. The framework incorporates three-dimensional building data and protection standards to better capture the spatial nuances of flood risk.

Objective

• To develop a height-aware and protection-informed flood assessment framework that accounts for the vertical dimension of exposure.
• To integrate building height and flood protection standards into probabilistic flood risk frameworks.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: Global, with focus on urban areas and functional urban areas (FUAs).
• Temporal Scale: Annualized indicators are used to assess average annual impacts in urban areas across mapped return periods.

Methodology and Data

• Models used: The study uses a combination of machine learning algorithms and probabilistic modeling techniques.
• Data sources:
  • Global building height datasets (e.g., WSF3D, GBH2020)
  • Flood protection standards from the FLOPROS database
  • High-resolution maps integrating population density, GDP, and land use data

Main Results

• The framework's integration of building height and flood protection standards redistributes global risk shares toward regions with shorter building stocks.
• Applying regional flood protection standards concentrates residual risk in the least-protected regions.
• Countries with robust flood defenses (e.g., China, Japan) see damage reduced to near zero.

Contributions

• This study provides a comprehensive framework that addresses the limitations of conventional depth-damage approaches by incorporating three-dimensional building data and protection standards.
• The framework advances urban flood risk understanding and offers actionable insights for targeted interventions.

Funding

• National Science Foundation (NSF)
• European Research Council (ERC)
• World Meteorological Organization (WMO)

Citation

@article{Liang2026Heightaware,
  author = {Liang, Jiayong and Hilaly, Imaan and Gao, Xuyan and Guan, ChengHe and Li, Ying and Huang, Kangning},
  title = {Height-aware and protection-informed flood assessment shifts global urban risk distribution},
  journal = {Scientific Reports},
  year = {2026},
  doi = {10.1038/s41598-026-70981-w},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-70981-w}
}