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What information local planning authorities need to include in a strategic flood risk assessment.

Local planning authorities should carry out a strategic flood risk assessment (SFRA) for their area. You should use this guide and the good practice examples to help you do this.

The SFRA will help various parties consider flood risk when making planning decisions about the design and location of any:

In your SFRA, you should assess the:

Your SFRA will help your planning authority make decisions about:

You also need it to help you:

Your SFRA will be used by:

The Environment Agency uses your SFRA to inform their advice to you about the local plan or spatial development strategy.

Developers and flood risk consultants will use your SFRA:

Emergency planners, the emergency services and local resilience forums will use your SFRA to:

Risk management authorities will use your SFRA to:

Other departments within your council will use your SFRA to inform their work on, for example:

Neighbourhood planning bodies will use your SFRA when considering whether neighbourhood planning areas may be appropriate for development.

Other local planning authorities will use your SFRA to inform their SFRAs, particularly in relation to cross-border risks and opportunities.

Minerals and waste planning authorities will use your SFRA to inform their minerals and waste local plans. Combined authorities will use your SFRA to inform spatial development strategies. They may need to prepare additional flood risk information, depending on what is included in their plans.

Check your existing SFRA is up to date early in the process of producing your local plan or spatial development strategy. You’ll need an up-to-date SFRA to make policies and decisions about the type and location of development.

You may need to either:

You may also need to review your SFRA when there are changes to:

You should review your SFRA after a significant flood event.

You should set up appropriate governance arrangements at an early stage to cover SFRA:

It may be appropriate to use the same governance as the local plan or spatial development strategy.

You should assign a single point of contact for preparing your SFRA. This individual would benefit from having relevant skills and experience in flood risk management.

Consider creating a steering group to guide the SFRA preparation. It should consist of relevant experts from a range of different organisations and council departments.

Working jointly with other local planning authorities to produce an SFRA might help you find better ways to deal with the causes and impacts of flooding.

A joint SFRA could save money, improve consistency and speed up decision making, particularly when one or more of the following applies:

You need to consult certain organisations to help complete your SFRA. You should consult early and widely. Maximise opportunities to engage with consultees by joining with other planned engagement.

You should carry out a consultation on the scope of your SFRA before commissioning any work on the document itself. At this early stage, the main organisations to consult are:

Contact the Environment Agency to discuss your needs. They can provide initial advice on your SFRA for free, but will need to charge for detailed advice.

You should also consult with other departments within your council to make sure the scope of your SFRA will help inform other work areas. Other departments may also be able to provide useful data, support or alternative sources of funding for your SFRA.

Depending on the sources of flooding in your area, it may also be appropriate to consult with other organisations. They may be able to provide helpful advice, information or support such as:

You should continue to consult with the Environment Agency and your lead local flood authority. In addition, you should now also consult with:

Ask those you’re consulting with to:

You should share your completed SFRA with those you consulted during its preparation.

You should include relevant flood risk information on the mapping systems you use to check and administer planning applications. This should include:

You may also wish to:

All local planning authorities need to produce a level 1 SFRA.

You may also need to produce a level 2 SFRA depending on whether your local authority has plans for development in flood risk areas.

Your level 1 SFRA needs to include enough detail so you can identify all flood risk areas. Flood risk areas should:

You may then need to carry out a level 2 SFRA if either:

Your level 2 SFRA should give more detail on the nature of the flood risks you’ve identified.

If you’re still not sure whether you need to prepare a level 2 SFRA, contact the Environment Agency and your lead local flood authority for advice.

Your level 1 SFRA should cover flood risks for the area covered by:

You should also consider flood risks to and from surrounding areas by referring to strategic documents such as:

Your level 1 SFRA should be published online and include:

Include online maps showing all sources of flood risk that affect your area, or could in the future.

You could combine several sources of information onto fewer maps, if it would make your SFRA easier to use.

For example, you could produce a single map which works for both:

You may need to commission a flood consultant to create these maps for you.

Your level 1 SFRA should also include a supporting report with information on:

Make sure you can update the maps and report separately so that it’s easy to keep your SFRA accurate.

Your SFRA should also have a user guidance section, explaining how to use the SFRA. Include guidance on which maps and sections users should refer to for certain tasks.

You should include a method to rank flood risk. This ranking will inform how to apply the sequential test to plans and planning applications. You should discuss and agree the method with the Environment Agency. Factors to consider when creating your ranking method could include the:

Your SFRA could also include guidance on suitable ‘areas of search’ for applying the sequential test to common development types. ‘Areas of search’ are places to look for alternative, lower risk sites. Doing this will help to improve the rigor and consistency of the sequential test. It will also provide more certainty for developers.

Your maps should show risk of flooding from:

You can use integrated catchment modelling if a quality assurance process shows it’s fit for purpose. However, do not use integrated catchment modelling in isolation. Make sure you use it together with other sources of information so you do not underestimate flood risk.

On maps, label rivers and other watercourses as either:

Your maps should show the administrative areas of any:

Your maps should show historic instances of flooding and their sources. Get data from:

Your maps should show how people in your area can receive flood warnings.

You can find information online on flood warning areas and flood alert areas. You can also contact the Environment Agency for information, if you need to.

Show flood risk management features and structures on your maps as well as providing information about them in your supporting report.

You should describe important flood risk management structures or features relevant to your area. These could include:

You should also explain how your users can find up-to-date detailed information about flood risk management features and structures. This is important as this information will change over time.

For important flood risk management features and structures, you should describe or show on your maps:

You should identify and label on the maps:

In your report, you should include a detailed explanation of your approach to defining and mapping functional floodplain.

You may decide to assess the potential impacts of climate change on the future extent of functional floodplain. This will help inform the sequential approach.

Take into account local circumstances when you define the functional floodplain. You should use the parameters set out in the planning practice guidance as a starting point to identify the functional floodplain.

In any modelling used to identify the functional floodplain, include defences and other flood risk management features and structures.

You may not need to designate the functional floodplain in locations where evidence shows flooding would be prevented by existing:

Water storage areas are shown on the flood map for planning. Contact the Environment Agency to check if they are suitable to include in your designation of the functional floodplain.

If you do not have enough detailed information to identify the functional floodplain, make this clear on your maps. This ensures the risk is not underestimated.

Instead, use site-specific flood risk assessments to determine whether a site is affected by functional floodplain. If sites are proposed for development in such areas in your local plan, you’ll need to do a level 2 assessment to map the location of functional floodplain.

You can get information about reservoir flooding using the Environment Agency’s long term flood risk maps. Read guidance on when and how to use the reservoir flood maps.

Local authorities, as category 1 responders, can access more detailed information about reservoir risk using the Resilience Direct system.

Include an assessment of the cumulative impacts of development and land-use change.

This should include any impact expected from:

Where impacts are likely to be significant, you may find it useful to carry out some sensitivity testing. You can do this by changing the parameters in relevant flood models. Contact the Environment Agency to discuss the best way to do this.

This assessment should inform whether you need to take further action to prevent or mitigate these cumulative impacts. Actions could include:

You can remove permitted development rights by:

including a condition on individual planning permissions in line with paragraph 52 of the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) - you should only do this where there is a clear justification to do so

making an article 4 direction in line with paragraph 53 of the NPPF

All of these will help you identify any development that may need to be relocated to sustainable locations.

You can use detailed flood models to show the impact of climate change on flood risk.

You may need to commission new or updated modelling if:

You may be able to commission modelling with other planning authorities, the Environment Agency or relevant developers to share the benefits and costs. Any new modelling will need to go through a transparent quality assurance process to make sure it is fit for purpose. Contact your local Environment Agency office for the available data and to discuss joint working and quality assurance.

When you assess the impacts of climate change on flood risk you should use the allowances for your area.

You’ll need information in your SFRA on the effect of climate change on flood risk to:

Write about any opportunities to reduce the causes and impacts of flooding.

You should refer to relevant strategic flood risk documents to help you identify opportunities. These might include:

Get this information from the Environment Agency, the lead local flood authority and the water company. You can also get this information from your local:

You can also get information on natural flood management from:

Your report should be consistent with and make use of information from:

You should include recommendations for:

You should produce these recommendations in consultation with:

Your level 2 SFRA can either:

Your level 2 SFRA should be published online and should include a:

It should allow you to:

In your level 1 SFRA, your maps showed the sources and extents of flood risk. In your level 2 SFRA, you should now show more detailed maps to illustrate the nature of the flood risks.

Include a user guidance section detailing how it should be used. This should include guidance on which maps and sections of the report to refer to in different circumstances.

You should include detailed mapping about the nature of flooding from all sources. Consider the risks now and in the future.

For information about how to calculate flood hazard, check flood risk assessment guidance for new development particularly table 13.1 of phase 2 full technical report.

Identify the communities, features, structures and properties affected by flood risk.

You may have to commission new or updated models, or rerun existing models if the information you need is not available.

When assessing the nature of risk from all sources of flooding, take climate change into account.

Assess what would happen if flood risk management features and structures failed or were breached. You should also consider what would happen if the design standard of flood risk structures or features were exceeded. The design standard is the magnitude of flood events that structures or features are designed to cope with. Take climate change into account.

Be cautious about any assumptions you make, as it’s difficult to predict changes to flood risk management features and structures over the lifetime of development.

Decide what will be the most likely mechanism, or combination of mechanisms of future flooding, for example breach or overtopping. To do this:

Use breach and detailed models to show what would happen if:

Ask the Environment Agency for the information they hold on flood defence breach.

If breach models are not available, ask the Environment Agency how to assess the potential effect and reach of flood water if a defence is breached. Also refer to Flood Risk Assessment Guidance for New Development, particularly section 12 of phase 2 full technical report.

Your maps should show clearly whether sites are at risk from:

If proposed development is at risk of flooding from a reservoir, assess if the design or maintenance of the reservoir would need improving. You may need evidence and expert advice to do this. You can check if the development is at risk of flooding from a reservoir using the Environment Agency’s long term flood risk maps. Read guidance on when and how to use the reservoir flood maps.

Refer to relevant guidance in the Institution of Civil Engineers’ publication Floods and Reservoir Safety (4th edition) and the Environment Agency’s guide to risk assessment for reservoir safety management. Consider seeking expert advice from an all reservoirs panel engineer.

If development could affect the operation of a reservoir, you should assess the impact on flood risk. Read guidance on understanding and assessing reservoir safety. Work out the cost and the impacts of additional work. Consult the reservoir owner or operator to help you.

Local authorities, as category 1 responders, can access more detailed information about reservoir risk and reservoir owners using the Resilience Direct system.

If you cannot identify sites with a lower risk of flooding, information in the level 2 SFRA will inform the sequential test by providing information on:

This will help you find the sites within flood risk areas which have the lowest risk.

Your level 2 SFRA should build on the method for ranking flood risk included in your level 1 SFRA. The method should make use of the additional flood risk information included in your level 2 SFRA. You should discuss and agree the method with the Environment Agency.

You should include information in your SFRA which will allow your local planning authority to decide whether proposed development is capable of being:

Assess access and escape routes in and out of areas where development is proposed. Identify and show on your map any evacuation routes which would stay dry, or experience only non-hazardous flooding.

You should consult with emergency planners, the emergency services and local resilience forums when preparing this information.

Your level 2 SFRA should provide information that you and developers can use to apply the exception test. This should show how development could:

This information should also help you assess whether your local plan will be deliverable.

You may now be able to refine or add to any level 1 SFRA maps or guidance in the following level 2 SFRA sections:

New section added on setting up governance arrangements for preparing your SFRA. Updated who to consult and when, and what to include in your level 1 SFRAS. Improved links to local nature recovery strategies, drainage (sewerage) and wastewater management plans and local design codes/guides. Guidance on improving efficiency and clarity on the sequential test and use of sustainable drainage.

The 'reservoir' bullet in the 'Mapped flood risk from all sources section' is updated to clarify how information should be used.

Detailed information has been added in all sections for local planning authorities, on how to prepare a strategic flood risk assessment.

Added content to sections: Level 1 and Level 2 strategic flood risk assessment. Change link for "These maps should show: •main rivers" to point to the Main River map

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