Mapping Climate-Related Hazards to Historic Sites
Author(s): Joshua Deru, David Dowding, Emily Crowe, Hannah Fluck
This project aims to build upon an initial climate risk mapping project (Phase 1.0)commissioned by the National Trust in 2020. Phase 1.0 mapped six key climate hazards to heritage sites (Overheating & Humidity, Storm Damage, Slope Failure, Flooding, Shrink- Swell, and Coastal Risk) across England, Wales and Northern Ireland. Led by a consortia of UK heritage organisations1, Phase 1.5 seeks to expand and develop these initial pilot maps by including a number of additional hazards and datasets, as well as expanding the maps to include the entire United Kingdom. The project has been created primarily for internal GIS teams looking to assess climate risk to heritage sites, but has been designed with capacity for further builds such as additional datasets, higher data resolutions, and open-source public viewing platforms. The analysis has been performed using Geographic Information System (GIS) Mapping, combining climate, geomorphological and hydrological data in relation to a set of defined hazard thresholds – described fully in Section 2.0: Methodology. The key final output is a set of hexagonally gridded (‘HexGrid’) GIS risk maps, detailing the risks posed by each of the hazards identified. These have been uploaded to a shared google drive in the form of GIS shapefiles2. This report provides a summary of the methodology, a guide to using the data, and recommendations for implementation as part of a climate adaptation and mitigation strategy. Specifically for Historic England (HE), this report also summarises the key findings resulting from assessing heritage assets on the National Heritage List for England (NHLE) in the context of the risk maps. This data can be used to inform national, regional and local priorities for climate.
- Report Number:
- 27/2022
- Series:
- Research Report
- Pages:
- 43
- Keywords:
- Climate Change Risks
