Presidential blog: Reflections on flood resilience in Scotland

18 March 2025

CIWEM President Hannah Burgess talks to Rick Haynes, Chair of our Scottish Branch about his reflections on the Scottish Flood Resilience Conference and his plans for the year ahead

Earlier this year, I attended the formal launch of Flo the Flood Bus at the Scottish Flood Resilience Conference in Edinburgh, where I caught up with a number of members from our CIWEM Scottish Branch, including the current chair Rick Haynes.

Rick has been on the committee for a number of years and I was impressed by his energy and enthusiasm to reinvigorate local events, some of which I hope to attend later in my committee year.

Here are Rick’s reflections on the conference and his plans for the Scottish Branch over the next year.

What were your reflections on the conference?

My view is that the Conference reflects the necessary adjustment from purely 'traditional' flood risk management approaches to something adding the layers covering flood resilience interventions.

The launch of 'Flo', the FloodRe / Scottish Flood Forum flood advice bus, is a clear indication of the direction of travel and I hope it reaches new communities and assists in making the Scottish public more resilient to the effects of flooding caused by climate change.

The number of exhibitors and enthusiasm of attendees, especially the representatives from local primary schools and early career professionals suggests a strong level of need and support for flood risk management in Scotland, and that can only be a positive.

Can you tell us about the plans you have for the CIWEM Scottish Branch over the next year?

My plan is to reinvigorate the CIWEM Scottish Branch in 2025. Since the COVID pandemic, working practices have changed immeasurably, and the pressures on individuals as part of their various organisations has presented a challenge in terms of volunteer role availability.

There have also been a number of climate driven events and the sheer density of flood risk management projects to challenge a limited resource pool.

CIWEM President Hannah Burgess at Scottish Flood Resilience Conference

I'm also looking for new-blood for the Scottish Branch Committee too, to try to bring new ideas and experiences, and to show that by working together we can innovate and learn from others in the field. If there's one thing I've focused on is that I'm never too old to learn!

I hope to be able to borrow from the experiences of experts in Scotland to share the knowledge and develop new environmental engineers to address the Climate Emergency.

The Presidential Ripple effect is about inspiring others to take positive steps to influence others to protect and enhance our environment. Please can you share one key thing that you’d like readers to take away from work on adaptation and resilience in Scotland?

The takeaway is that we need to be pragmatic and flexible. There is no one-size-fits-all, and just because an approach has been overwhelmingly positive in one location doesn't necessarily mean it is transferable. That being said, we must not revert and simply use the approaches of the past with a blind excuse of 'it's what we've always done'.

My personal view is that the principles of Natural Flood Management as a move towards working with nature, are an enhancement of the natural environment, are solid and bring a wide range of benefits beyond the initial expectation to manage excess flood flows, but I think the flood risk management effectiveness has been oversold.

I feel that we cannot abandon the 'traditional' approaches as they are both tangible and measurably effective, but we can supplement them with NFM and flood resilience measures as all engineered approaches have finite capacities. A managed adaptive approach that encompasses NFM components would be a sensible start for all projects in this arena.

One final thought on this is that we must remember that nature will always win. We must acknowledge the fact that for communities to be sustainable it may be that the community has to undertake managed retreat and some locations may need to be abandoned. It is not a palatable approach, but it may be the pragmatic conclusion in certain locations.

Further reading:

• Get the latest news from the CIWEM Presidential team
• Find your local CIWEM Branch
• Follow CIWEM Scotland Branch on LinkedIn