A climate services perspective on Norwegian stormwater-related databases

Abstract

Floods and stormwater events are the costliest natural catastrophes. Costs are expected to increase due to urbanization and climate change. Mitigation is needed. Different stakeholders with different motivations unfortunately often evaluate vulnerability by using fragmented and incomplete data sources. This paper intends to review the different approaches for collecting and analyzing data, and to evaluate their usefulness within the proposed framework for a “smart” use of data. The objectives of this work have been to review qualitatively and quantitatively a selection of Norwegian stormwater-related databases and to propose measures for improvement. The findings are seen according to the climate services literature and show that that data is spread around a heterogeneous community of stakeholders concerned with different motivations, different needs, and different levels of data processing. In general, the needs of the different stakeholders have not been surveyed and defined systematically enough and there is a substantial potential in upgrading from the delivery of passive raw data to the delivery of knowledge-driven decision-support tools.