Canadian homeowners do not have the information they need to know if they can purchase flood coverage, leaving them exposed to the extensive financial threat. A current study from the University of Waterloo observed flood mapping facts in Canada were insufficient, incomplete, hard to find, and sundry widely from province to province.
“With governments beginning to step far away from flood recovery help in favor of having house owners purchase non-public insurance, it’s miles clean homeowners lack get admission to records that would help them determine if they ought to add that protection to their regulations,” said Daniel Henstra, a professor of political, technological know-how at Waterloo’s Faculty of Arts. “Considering that contemporary family debt tiers would possibly prevent a home owner’s capability to pay the tens-of-hundreds of dollars often related to an average flood, Canada desires to make better information to be had to house owners as a way to decide if their homes are at risk.”
Henstra carried out the study with professor Jason Thistlethwaite and Ph.D. candidate Andrea Minano, both of the Faculty of Environment at Waterloo.
In the direction of their examination, the researchers examined the to be had, online data of greater than three hundred groups across Canada which can be categorized as an excessive hazard for flooding. Sources of facts protected data made to be had by government and non-government web assets.
The researchers located that sixty-two percent of the available maps did no longer meet the simple criteria for informing the public about flood chance.
The researchers also determined that the availability of flood maps various by way of location with the general nice of Canada’s mapping regime under other OECD nations.
In Ontario, flood maps have been available on conservation authority websites and based on the authority’s region or impact. Quebec had a provincial flood maps portal. Alberta additionally had a provincial web portal, but simplest had information for 20 groups. British Columbia had a few mapping to be had, but the maps relied on humans understanding what river basin their domestic was closest to.
“In this exercise, it became quickly apparent that mapping assets are in large part previous and the sources which are available are hard to locate,” stated Minano. “If Canada desires to circulate from authorities assistance to assist humans in recovering from catastrophic flooding to a model primarily based on home coverage purchased at the discretion of the homeowner, our maps and their availability want to improve.”
