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Home > Coastal and floodplains > Floodplains >

Floodplains

Flood Risk in NSW results in significant impacts. Flooding causes severe economic damage and emotional distress. Flooding in urban and rural NSW costs our economy about $250 million each year, and the human impact is greater still.

Local government in NSW has the primary responsibility for controlling the development of flood prone land, but the NSW Government, through the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) and the State Emergency Service (SES), also has an important role to play in managing the flood risk across New South Wales.

DNR has a number of key roles in this area. These roles relate to:

• Development of flood policy, including the New South Wales Government’s Flood Prone Land Policy and Floodplain Development Manual 2005 and associated technical and operation policy to aid council in the management of flood risk. This involves interaction with a range of State and Commonwealth Agencies, local government and the floodplain risk management industry.
• Working with local councils to better manage flood prone land in coastal areas and in urban communities in inland New South Wales. We do this through the provision of funding and technical assistance for the preparation and implementation of floodplain risk management plans through the State Government’s Floodplain Management Program.
• Rural flood risk management within floodplains designated under Part 8 of the Water Act, 1912. DNR uses its licensing powers under the Water Act to assess and approve flood control works (earthworks, embankments or levees) which can affect the distribution of floodwaters within designated floodplains. DNR also prepares statutory floodplain management plans under the Water Act that set out schemes for the management of floodwaters and form the basis for assessing approvals. These plans, developed in consultation with local farming communities help to provide farmers with knowledge about their risk exposure and examine ways they can manage this risk while maintaining the flooding regimes to waterways and flood dependent ecosystems.
• Managing the provision of river gauging networks across the State to enable the delivery of flood warnings to communities across New South Wales. These gauging systems enable the Bureau of Meteorology to provide flood predictions to the State Emergency Service to enable it to issue flood warnings to the residents of New South Wales. These warnings enable people to react appropriately to flooding as it occurs. This reduces the danger of flooding to the community and individuals and may provide them an opportunity to reduce their flood damage through appropriate and timely actions.