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    Understanding the Drivers of Coastal Flood Exposure and Risk From 1860 to 2100
    (Hoboken, NJ : Wiley-Blackwell, 2022) Lincke, Daniel; Hinkel, Jochen; Mengel, Matthias; Nicholls, Robert J.
    Global coastal flood exposure (population and assets) has been growing since the beginning of the industrial age and is likely to continue to grow through 21st century. Three main drivers are responsible: (a) climate-related mean sea-level change, (b) vertical land movement contributing to relative sea-level rise, and (c) socio-economic development. This paper attributes growing coastal exposure and flood risk from 1860 to 2100 to these three drivers. For historic flood exposure (1860–2005) we find that the roughly six-fold increase in population exposure and 53-fold increase in asset exposure are almost completely explained by socio-economic development (>97% for population and >99% for assets). For future exposure (2005–2100), assuming a middle-of-the-road regionalized socio-economic scenario (SSP2) without coastal migration and sea-level rise according to RCP2.6 and RCP6.0, climate-change induced sea-level rise will become the most important driver for the growth in population exposure, while growth in asset exposure will still be mainly determined by socio-economic development.
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    Flood risk and climate change: global and regional perspectives
    (Milton Park : Taylor and Francis Ltd., 2014) Kundzewicz, Z.W.; Kanae, S.; Seneviratne, S.I.; Handmer, J.; Nicholls, N.; Peduzzi, P.; Mechler, R.; Bouwer, L.M.; Arnell, N.; Mach, K.; Muir-Wood, R.; Brakenridge, G.R.; Kron, W.; Benito, G.; Honda, Y.; Takahashi, K.; Sherstyukov, B.
    A holistic perspective on changing rainfall-driven flood risk is provided for the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Economic losses from floods have greatly increased, principally driven by the expanding exposure of assets at risk. It has not been possible to attribute rain-generated peak streamflow trends to anthropogenic climate change over the past several decades. Projected increases in the frequency and intensity of heavy rainfall, based on climate models, should contribute to increases in precipitation-generated local flooding (e.g. flash flooding and urban flooding). This article assesses the literature included in the IPCC SREX report and new literature published since, and includes an assessment of changes in flood risk in seven of the regions considered in the recent IPCC SREX report-Africa, Asia, Central and South America, Europe, North America, Oceania and Polar regions. Also considering newer publications, this article is consistent with the recent IPCC SREX assessment finding that the impacts of climate change on flood characteristics are highly sensitive to the detailed nature of those changes and that presently we have only low confidence1 in numerical projections of changes in flood magnitude or frequency resulting from climate change.