This $757,974 Project Grant awarded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) Engineering program (CFDA 47.041) supports research by The Pennsylvania State University, doing business as Penn State, to develop a systems modeling framework for designing climate-resilient levee infrastructure that supports equitable, resilient, and sustainable floodplain communities.
The project aims to address interactions between levee network performance, future climates, natural infrastructure, and behavioral factors that drive changes in flood risk across communities. It will create computational models integrating natural infrastructure, levee infrastructure, flood inundation risk, and levee decision-making to evaluate adaptation strategies and identify resilience-building interventions and policy options. This research has the potential to benefit floodplain communities nationwide by facilitating better-informed decisions that prioritize equity, resilience, and cost-effectiveness in levee adaptation.