Economic Exposure of Canadian Residential Properties to Flooding

Gabriel Morin; Mathieu Boudreault; Jason Thistlethwaite; Michael Bourdeau-Brien; Jacob Chenette; Daniel Henstra; Jonathan Raikes

doi:10.1111/jfr3.70012

Back

Economic Exposure of Canadian Residential Properties to Flooding

Journal article

Open access

Peer reviewed

Economic Exposure of Canadian Residential Properties to Flooding

Gabriel Morin, Mathieu Boudreault, Jason Thistlethwaite, Michael Bourdeau-Brien, Jacob Chenette, Daniel Henstra and Jonathan Raikes

Journal of Flood Risk Management, Vol.18, pp.1-14

2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/jfr3.70012

Files and links (1)

pdf

J Flood Risk Management - 2025 - Morin - Economic Exposure of Canadian Residential Properties to Flooding768.54 kBDownload View

Published VersionCC BY-NC V4.0, Open Access

Abstract

climate change adaptation

economic exposure

flood risk management

residential

risk-based approaches

Flood risk management (FRM) involves planning proactively for flooding in high‐risk areas to reduce its impacts on people and property. A key challenge for governments pursuing FRM is to pinpoint assets that are highly economically exposed and vulnerable to flood hazards in order to prioritize them in policy and planning. This paper presents a novel flood risk assessment, making use of a dataset that identifies the location, dwelling type, property characteristics, and potential economic losses of Canadian residential properties. The findings reveal that the average annual costs are $1.4B, but most of the risks are concentrated in high‐risk areas. Data gaps are uncovered that justify replication through local validation studies. The results provide a novel evidence base for specific reforms in Canada's approach to FRM, with a focus on insurance that improves both implementation and effectiveness.

Details

Title: Economic Exposure of Canadian Residential Properties to Flooding
Authors: Gabriel Morin - Université du Québec à Montréal
Mathieu Boudreault - Université du Québec à Montréal
Jason Thistlethwaite - University of Waterloo
Michael Bourdeau-Brien (Corresponding Author) - Université Laval
Jacob Chenette - Université du Québec à Montréal
Daniel Henstra - University of Waterloo
Jonathan Raikes - University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, Sustainability Research Cluster
Publication details: Journal of Flood Risk Management, Vol.18, pp.1-14
Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
Date published: 2025
DOI: 10.1111/jfr3.70012
ISSN: 1753-318X
Copyright note: © 2025 The Author(s). Journal of Flood Risk Management published by Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management and John Wiley & Sons Ltd. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided theoriginal work is properly cited and is not used for commercial purposes.
Data Availability: Data from Statistics Canada and Quebec's MAMH are freely and openly available.
Grant note: The authors received funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) through the Alliance program, with contributions from Public Safety Canada and the Insurance Bureau of Canada.
Organisation Unit: School of Law and Society; Sustainability Research Cluster
Language: English
Record Identifier: 991127096402621
Output Type: Journal article

Metrics

10 Record Views

2 Times Cited - Web of Science

InCites Highlights

These are selected metrics from InCites Benchmarking & Analytics tool, related to this output

Collaboration types: Domestic collaboration; International collaboration
Web Of Science research areas: Environmental Sciences; Water Resources

UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

This output has contributed to the advancement of the following goals:

Source: InCites