Author(s): Chaerin Lee; Donghwi Jung
Linked Author(s): Donghwi Jung
Keywords: Climate change Water-related natural disasters Flood damage estimation Global flood model
Abstract: Financial authorities in South Korea are increasingly mandating corporate disclosure of climate change adaptation efforts, such as Net Zero plan, changes in corporate governance, greenhouse gas emission reporting. Effective implementation of these measures requires robust quantification of physical and transition risks associated with climate changes including reasonably estimated future economic losses from water-related natural disasters (typhoon and flood). Estimating flood damage, which accounts for over 85% of property damage caused by natural disasters that occurred in South Korea in recent years (Ministry of the Interior and Safety, 2016–2023), is significant in quantifying physical risks. However, few efforts have been made to comprehensively estimate flood damage considering all three types of flooding -- fluvial, pluvial, and coastal. Recently developed global flood models (GFM) are addressing this gap, providing improved accuracy in flood damage estimation. This study first provides a comprehensive review of state-of-the-art methodologies for flood damage estimation, encompassing simple data-driven approaches (e. g., linear regression) to advanced global flood model. The review evaluates these methodologies in terms of spatial coverage, estimation accuracy, and data requirements. Building on this foundation, this study proposes a novel GIS-based approach to estimate regional monetary flood damage using GFM results and exposure information. Through spatial analysis, flood-prone exposures are identified, and associated damage costs are computed under various conditions reflecting levels of flood defense improvements and climate change scenarios. The estimated costs are compared with results obtained from other methodologies. The proposed approach can be used as a practical tool for (re) insurance corporations and policymakers to develop and refine climate change adaptation plans.
Year: 2025