Tennessee employs Stantec’s Flood Predictor tool

The Tennessee Economic and Community Development Department (TNECD), in partnership with leading global design and engineering firm Stantec, has integrated a new decision-support technology to strengthen its resiliency efforts against flooding statewide.

Flood Predictor is a Stantec.io digital product that delivers rapid probabilistic flood predictions. These predictions are based on data derived from machine learning informed by more than 30,000 hours of engineered flood modeling. As a result, Flood Predictor gives state and local officials the ability to efficiently analyze regional flood risks in near real time without the need for complex hydrology and hydraulic modeling, which often can take months to deliver.

With these advanced insights, officials can better inform the public which areas are at the highest risk and which routes are the safest to travel ahead of an extreme storm event.

TNECD will integrate Flood Predictor into its TNPlan web portal — an online repository of resilience data that gives government leaders and emergency management officials quick and efficient access to insights when future disasters strike. Funded by a U.S. Housing and Urban Development National Disaster Resilience Competition Grant, TNPlan and Flood Predictor will help address the unmet needs of communities statewide that arose from previous disasters.

“In the wake of extreme weather events, and the increasing frequency, Tennesseans have experienced intense floods that caused severe destruction and led to the tragic loss of lives,” said Kent Archer, Director of Community Infrastructure, Community and Rural development for TNECD. “By implementing this new technology, we’re giving disaster experts and community leaders across the state access to information that will allow our communities to better prepare for these types of events and help save lives.”

Stantec.io is an integrated digital services approach combining emerging technologies with subject matter expertise to address timely client project challenges.