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Leaky Dams and Flood Risk: What They Do, Where They Work, and What They Can’t Fix

Anyone who has watched the latest series of Clarkson's Farm will have seen Jeremy Clarkson wading into a stream at Diddly Squat to build what he gleefully describes, after a bit of reading on the government's website, as "large, leaky,…
Posted on 13th June, 2026
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The Flood Knowledge Gap Between Communities and Institutions

In 1724, a local historian described one Berkshire village as "a low and watery place" where "water is a dominant theme … with disastrous floods, both within and beyond living memory." More than two centuries later, that village still requires…
Posted on 11th May, 2026
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Nature-Based Flood and Drought Resilience: The Evidence Gap POSTnote 768 Just Flagged

Nature-based flood and drought resilience, a new briefing from the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology (POSTnote 768) published on 1 May 2026, includes a statistic worth dwelling on: research on the potential benefits of nature-based solutions outnumbers research on…
Posted on 5th May, 2026
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Fens 2100+: flood risk management is reaching its limits – and the Fens show why

The Fens 2100+ reports set out one of the clearest assessments yet of flood risk, drainage and water management in England. They do not introduce a new problem, but they quantify one that has been building for decades. Fens 2100+…
Posted on 28th April, 2026
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What are ‘spongy landscapes’ and how do they reduce flood risk?

Flood risk is often discussed in terms of rivers, drainage systems and flood defences. That makes sense, but it misses something important: a flood often starts long before water reaches a river channel or a roadside drain. It starts with…
Posted on 24th April, 2026
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England Land Use Framework Published: Flood Risk and Planning Impact

The government has published England’s first Land Use Framework, setting out a long-term strategy for how land is allocated across housing, farming, infrastructure and the natural environment. The framework responds to a fundamental constraint: land is finite, but demand is…
Posted on 20th March, 2026
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New CIRIA guidance encourages communities to help maintain local flood defences

New guidance published by CIRIA is encouraging communities to play a more active role in maintaining local flood risk assets, including drainage channels, culverts and smaller flood defence structures. The guidance forms a three-part suite (C821) aimed at supporting community…
Posted on 6th March, 2026
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How a £12.6m flood scheme is unlocking development in Stoke-on-Trent

The Fowlea Brook Flood Risk Management Scheme in Stoke-on-Trent has been completed by the Environment Agency, delivering a major upgrade to the city’s flood defences. The scheme is intended to reduce flood risk for 333 homes and businesses and represents…
Posted on 6th February, 2026
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Soils, Flooding and Resilience | World Soil Day

World Soil Day, observed each year on 5th December, highlights the critical importance of soils to environmental systems that are often taken for granted. Led by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization through the Global Soil Partnership, it focuses global…
Posted on 5th December, 2025
, in SuDS 
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RNLI Flood Rescue and UK Emergency Response

The Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) is widely recognised for its lifesaving work at sea. Increasingly, however, it also plays an important role in flood rescue across the UK, supporting emergency response during major inland flooding events. As extreme rainfall…
Posted on 20th November, 2025
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Resilience by Repetition: 25 Years on from the 2000 Severn Floods

When the River Severn burst its banks in the autumn of 2000, it wasn’t the first time Shrewsbury, Bewdley or Ironbridge had flooded — but it was the one that changed everything. Streets became rivers, businesses closed overnight, and entire…
Posted on 5th November, 2025
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York and the River Ouse Remember the Floods of 2000

In November 2000, the River Ouse rose higher than living memory. In a matter of hours, the postcard beauty of York’s riverside was replaced by a scene of eerie stillness: pub benches half-submerged, streetlamps reflected in brown floodwater, rescue boats…
Posted on 5th November, 2025
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Loughborough Study Shows Sediment Ponds Aid Flood Control

Recent research from Loughborough University has highlighted how sediment ponds—sometimes called “mini-wetlands” — can help farmers protect their land, improve water quality and strengthen natural flood resilience. While the study focused on agricultural benefits, the implications reach far wider. As…
Posted on 31st October, 2025
, in SuDS 
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Flood Resilience in England: A Wake-Up Call

Flooding in England is no longer a localised hazard — it is a national systems challenge. The House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee’s latest report, Flood Resilience in England (HC 550, October 2025), delivers a blunt assessment: the country remains…
Posted on 29th October, 2025
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Integrating Rainwater Harvesting into SuDS Design

Collecting rainwater isn’t a new idea. Many of us already do it at home, using a simple water butt to gather rain off the roof and reuse it on the garden. That, in essence, is what rainwater harvesting is: catching…
Posted on 24th October, 2025
, in SuDS 
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Green SuDS: Nature-Based Drainage in Modern Planning

Green SuDS are nature-based drainage features — swales, rain gardens, basins, green roofs and wetlands — that manage rainwater using vegetation and soil rather than buried pipes and tanks. Across England's planning system they have become the preferred form of…
Posted on 22nd October, 2025
, in SuDS 
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UK Tree Planting Shortfall Weakens Flood Resilience

New statistics confirm the UK is on course to miss critical tree planting targets by 2030. The latest Forestry Statistics 2025: Analysis report warns that, at current rates, the country will fall behind the Committee on Climate Change’s (CCC) trajectory…
Posted on 26th September, 2025
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Floods in a Drought: Why Drought Causes Flooding in the UK

Floods in a drought sound like a contradiction, but the two arrive together more often than people expect. When the ground has been baked hard by weeks of dry weather, it cannot absorb a sudden downpour. The rain runs straight…
Posted on 11th September, 2025
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Flood Defence Gets £7.9bn Investment in UK Infrastructure Push

The UK Government has unveiled the largest flood defence investment programme in the nation’s history, committing £7.9 billion over the next decade to better protect homes, businesses and critical infrastructure from rising climate-driven flood risks. This announcement comes amid growing public…
Posted on 19th June, 2025
, in NPPF 
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Riparian Ownership: Your Rights and Responsibilities in the UK

If you own, rent out or are developing land beside a river, stream, brook or ditch, you are almost certainly a riparian owner, and riparian ownership carries legal duties that most landowners never realise they hold until a flood or…
Posted on 6th June, 2025
, in FRAP 
, in IDB 
, in LLFA 
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What the 2025–30 London Surface Water Strategy Means for Planning

As climate change accelerates and urban environments become denser, cities around the world face mounting challenges in managing water. Nowhere is this truer than in London, where the convergence of ageing infrastructure, rising population pressures, and increasingly erratic weather patterns…
Posted on 22nd May, 2025
, in SuDS 
, in TfL 
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Natural Flood Management: EA Research Deep Dive & Analysis

Natural flood management (NFM) does work, but the honest answer is more useful than a simple yes. The Environment Agency's latest evidence shows that measures which slow, store and filter water across a catchment can measurably lower flood peaks, especially…
Posted on 13th February, 2025
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Natural Flood Management Schemes in the UK: How Real Projects Slow the Flow

Natural flood management schemes use woodland, wetlands, leaky dams and better-managed soils to slow and store rainwater across a catchment, taking the edge off flood peaks downstream. Across the UK, councils, rivers trusts and landowners now run dozens of these…
Posted on 3rd February, 2025
, in NFM 
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What is BRE365 Infiltration Testing (Soakaway Design)?

BRE365 infiltration testing is the in-ground test that measures how fast your site's soil can absorb surface water, so you can prove a soakaway will work and size it correctly. It follows BRE Digest 365, the standard UK method for…
Posted on 2nd December, 2024
, in NPPF 
, in SuDS 
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The Environment Agency (EA): Flood Risk and Planning

The Environment Agency is the government's statutory adviser on flood risk in the English planning system. It does not decide planning applications, but where a site carries flood risk its advice usually shapes whether permission is granted, refused, or held…
Posted on 28th August, 2024
, in NPPF 
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Internal Drainage Boards (IDBs): what they do and why they matter for planning

An internal drainage board (IDB) is an independent public body that manages water levels and land drainage in a low-lying area at particular risk of flooding. England has 112 IDBs covering around 1.2 million hectares, roughly 9.7% of the country,…
Posted on 27th August, 2024
, in NPPF 
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Beavers and Flooding: Do Beaver Dams Reduce Flood Risk?

For most of the last 400 years, beavers were missing from Britain, hunted out for their fur, meat and scent glands. Now they are back, and the policy around them has changed faster in the last two years than in…
Posted on 19th February, 2018
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