Council to fund research for flood defences

Dublin City Council is to invest €2 million to help research ways to combat flooding in the capital.

The council said today it has been allocated €1 million in EU funding and will contribute a further €1 million of its own funds to look at ways to bolster the city’s flood defences.

Dublin City Council received the grant assistance to enable it to participate in a new project that will focus on pluvial flooding arising from extreme rainfall events.

The council along with several other European cities has formed a consortium called ‘Flood Resilience Cities’ (Flood ResilienCity) which aims to identify how to best defend a city against flooding.

The project is to be officially launched in Mainz, Germany on Monday September 8th.

The council’s participation in the new project coincides with the completion of the Safer project, an early warning system based around a computer programme, which combines information on weather conditions and tide levels to predict when there is a risk of a tidal surge.

The system, which was introduced in the aftermath of the February 2002 floods which led to widespread flooding in residential areas close to Dublin Port and the south docks, provides a warning of potential flood conditions four days in advance.

Fianna Fáil MEP Eoin Ryan welcomed news of the EU funding, saying it would help the Council develop new, modern and innovative techniques to combat flooding in the captial.

“We have all seen the total damage which flooding has caused to local communities in Dublin, in Ireland and across Europe in recent times. This new EU initiative will start the process of improving flood relief programmes in Europe and the scheme is long overdue," said Mr Ryan.