Topic: The Future of Flood Risk Management and Resiliency: Real-Time Flood Forecasting at the Street Level

Speakers

Peter Singhofen, PE, President, Streamline Technologies
Kent Boulicault, PE, Principal Engineer, Singhofen & Associates

Summary

Extreme weather and rising sea levels pose a significant threat to our nation’s communities and to the readiness and resiliency of our DOD installations. The damages to Tyndall and Offutt Air Force Bases in 2018 and 2019 alone are on the order of $5 billion. It is estimated that these extreme weather conditions may cause more than $20 billion in flood damages this year. Regardless of the location, the ability to prepare, mitigate, and recover is at the very core of our nation’s goals of becoming resilient in the face of these threats. Until now, we have not had practical tools that could give us reliable forecasted information on flooding conditions at the street-level that could revolutionize our efforts to be more resilient. This presentation will demonstrate, through a series of examples, an approach that leverages NOAA’s real-time and forecasted precipitation-related data along with rapidly developed and/or existing available H&H models to provide advanced notice of site-specific flooding risks (buildings, roads, airstrips, lift stations, etc.). The resultant approach with a user-friendly dashboard and automated advanced warning alerts provides a risk-informed decision tool that will help emergency management personnel (and structure operators on civil works projects) prepare for potential threats, mitigate the risks and damages, and put the recovery efforts in place in advance of the threat.

 

Peter Singhofen, PE

Pete is the original founder of Singhofen & Associates, current President of Streamline Technologies, and the developer of the H&H model, ICPR. He has been a water resource professional for more than 35 years specializing in distributive physically-based integrated modeling of large-scale surface and groundwater systems. Today he focuses on innovations in real-time flood forecasting at the street level and more robust approaches to watershed-scale water quality modeling and BMP development.

Kent Boulicault, PE

Kent is one of the owners of Singhofen & Associates and has 30 years of experience addressing surface water and environmental issues at the local, state, and federal levels. He has been responsible for projects ranging from the legislatively funded Myakka River Watershed Initiative that spanned 5 counties to flood control projects in Puerto Rico including the Arecibo Job Corps Center for the DOL and a portion of the Rio Puerto Nuevo Project for the USACE Philadelphia and Jacksonville Districts. He has been a strong proponent of addressing the implications of sea-level rise and developing model tools to assess our vulnerabilities and make capital projects more resilient. Today he works closely with Pete on real-time flood forecasting projects to improve our ability to manage and reduce flood risks at our nation’s installations and communities.

For more information: Keith Ball at [email protected]