Version of 20 March 2017
Support for the Update of the Floods Directive's ReportingSchemas and Guidance
Concept Paper
for Discussion of the WGF Sub-group on Reporting
16-17 March 2017, Bucharest
1.Introduction and Objectives
The objective of this exercise is to update the Floods Directive’s (FD) reporting tools (reporting guidance, electronic schemas and quality assurance specifications) for the purpose of the next cycle of reporting associated with the Preliminary Flood Risk Assessment/Areas of Potentially Significant Flood Risk (PFRAs/APSFRs), Flood Hazard and Flood Risk Maps (FHRMs) and Flood Risk Management Plans (FRMPs). The Commission has been through the process of updating the WFD Reporting Guidance and Tools for the WFD and therefore has this process and the lessons learned from it in mind for informing the update of the FD reporting tools. In addition, understanding and implementing the lessons learned from the first cycle of reporting the FD is also a key driver for this exercise.
Two key lessons learned from reporting under the FD (completed for the PFRAs/APSFRs, FHRMs and currently in progress for the FRMPs)are reflected in the requirements of the Commission for this work, namely to: develop more of an “options to choose from” approach in the updated reporting schemas, and: to give greater emphasis to data reporting rather than text based reporting (without eliminating the latter if considered necessary). The assessment of reporting of the first cycle of the FD, has produced lessons learnt from the reporting and assessment of PFRA and APSFR and from the reporting and assessment of FHRM. Lessons learnt will be reviewed, translated and incorporated into the revised schemas and guidance.
The exercise has been divided into two main tasks:
Task 1: Support for the development of an updated reporting guidance
The delivery of this task is framed within a series of key meetings to be held with the Working Group on Floods Sub-group on Reporting (Sub-WGF on R) with review of the draft package of reporting tools by the CIS SCG in early November 2017, prior to submission for endorsement by the WDs in December.
Based on the work done so far and on the discussions that will take place within the Sub-WGFon R, the updated CIS Guidance Document will be produced which will replace theexisting Guidance Document Number 29 and will set the framework for the reporting and for describing the updated schemas.
Task 2: Development of the reporting schemas and specification for quality assurance procedures
The necessary reporting schemas will be developed using a UML development tool that includes documentation features and links to database development (such as Enterprise Architect).The starting point for the reporting schemas, in terms of content, will be the schemas that were developed for the 2016 reporting. The approach will be similar to thatadopted for the Water Framework Directive in 2016, with limited recourse to text fields and bearing in mind the need to maximise the possibilities of automatic extraction and processing of the information.
The purpose of this document is to provide the background for discussion at the 1st Technical Meeting of the Sub-WGF on Rto be held in Bucharest on the 16th and 17th of March. The focus of this paper is on: summarising the proposed approach to the project; presenting some limited examples of possible updates to the reporting elements (principally the schemas) based on the lessons learnt; identifying data needs, and; considering some key discussion questions for the meeting.
2.Summary of proposed approach
2.1Task 1: Support for the development of an updated reporting guidance
2.1.1Step 1: Review Guidance Document 29 in light of lessons learned
A review of Guidance Document 29 (and its relevant support documents) will be undertaken on a schema element by schema element basis taking account of specific lessons learned (for PFRAs/APSFRs, FHRMs).The outcome of the review will be a set of proposed changes to each schema element. This review process has started (see Section 3).
2.1.2Step 2: Review of end-user needs
This sub-task will involve a review of how the European Commission and European Environment Agency (EEA) will want to use the information provided. In particular, it will be important to understand whether there were any significant gaps in the assessments that need to be addressed in subsequent cycles. Part of this process will include the compilation of a list of products that can be derived from the information provided.
The WFD Reporting Guidance, for certain schema elements, provides tables of the products that arise from the reporting of data and information from MS including the sources of detailed information and aggregation rules. Similar outputs have been produced for elements of the FD (see Section 4) and these will be updated as part of this project.
2.1.3Step 3: Development of document - A Review of Floods Directive Reporting
The reviews carried out under Steps 1 and 2 will be used to compile the above report which will provide an overall assessment of the phase 1 reporting including a summary of the lessons learnt along with proposed changes relevant to the reporting guidance, electronic schemas and quality assurance elements. This will inform the development of an early draft of the updated Guidance document (including the electronic schemas).
2.1.4Step 4: Development of revised reporting guidance
An early draft of the updated Guidance document will be prepared for discussion at the two-day technical meeting in May 2017 (see schedule below). Following this meeting, a new draft of the Guidance will be developed, taking into account consolidated comments, in time for further discussion in September. The structure of the individual chapters of the updated Guidance Document will follow the format of the current WFD Reporting Guidance. A key point to note is the importance that will be placed on the description of the schema elements (see Section 3 below). A first draft of the updated Guidance Document will be sent out to the Commission for written comment over the summer (2017) in order that the third Sub-WGF on Reporting meeting in September can focus on any contentious issues.
Task 1 Deliverables:- Discussion document forming the basis of the 1stmeeting to be held in Bucharest
- Documents for Sub-WGF on R (2nd, 3rd and final meetings)
- Documents for SCG
- Documents to be sent to WDs
- Updated Guidance document on reporting for the Floods Directive
2.2Task 2: Development of the reporting schemas and specification for quality assurance procedures
This task will focus on defining the quality checks that will need to be included within the initial design of the schemas. Similarly,there will need to be consultation during the development of the guidance to ensure that the requirements for addressing any gaps and updating of the schemas can be modelled.
The reporting schemas to be produced will be designed to reduce the reporting burden on Member States (MS), facilitate the processing and extraction of information and facilitate the assessment and comparison among MS on the implementation of the Directive, using best practices and lessons learnt from the similar process carried out for the development of the reporting schemas for the WFD.
2.2.1Data modelling: development of reporting schemas
After initial drafts of the schemas (schema sketches) have been created and agreed at the meeting in May, the initial design will be translated into a UML conceptual model. The tool to be used for this is e.g. Enterprise Architect.The schemas developed will be aligned, as far as possible, with the requirements of INSPIRE.
2.2.2Specification for quality assurance procedures
A QA processes will be developed (similar to that developed under Reportnet for WFD and E-PRTR) that generates instant messages as preliminary checks from which Member States are advised of errors in the data reported.
During data modelling, the quality requirements that the data has to fulfil will be agreed. Some of the requirements will be encoded as part of the data model and derivedas simple type constraints (“This field contains a Datetime”), value constraints (“the value for this date must be in the range between 2016 and 2020”) or existence constraints (“This value may not be null”). There will be additional quality constraints to these that will also need to be accounted for.
Task 2 Deliverables:Specifications for automatic quality assurance routines.
Updated electronic schemas (UML model, XML and GML schemas).
2.3Work programme
Table 2.1 below provides a summary of meetings, milestones and deliverables.
Table 2.1Meetings, Milestones and deliverables
Meetings / Deliverables/milestones / DateStart / Mid-February 2017
Discussion Document sent to Sub-WGF on R / 10 March 2017
Sub-WGF on R – 1st Meeting (Bucharest) / 16-17 March 2017
Early draft of updated Guidance document – basis for the extended 2nd meeting of the Sub-group on Reporting / Middle of May 2017
Sub-WGF on R – 2nd meeting, extended & technical (Brussels) / 30-31 May 2017
First draft of updated Guidance Document sent to European Commission/Sub-WGF on R for written comment / Middle to end of June 2017
Second draft of Guidance Document accounting for Commission//Sub-WGF on R comments / Middle of August 2017
Sub-WGF on R – 3rdMeeting and possible Interim Meeting with the European Commission (Brussels) / 6September 2017
Final draft of updated Guidance Document, draft schemas and specifications for automatic QA/QC routines sent to Commission and Sub-WGF on R / End of September 2017
Sub-WGF on R – Final Meeting (Estonia) / Agreement/finalisation of the Guidance document, schemas and specifications for automatic QA/QC routines / Week of 16-20 October 2017 (17 October 2017 TBC)
Finalised reporting tools provided prior to CIS SCG Meeting / End of October 2017
CIS SCG Meeting (Brussels) / 9-10 November 2017
Package of Reporting Tools sent to WD / End of November 2017
WD Meeting (Estonia) / 4-5 December2017
Final draft of Package of Reporting Tools with Commission / January 2018
Final Meeting with Commission / February 2018
Final Package of Tools / March 2018
1
Version of 20 March 2017
3.Review of selected elements of original guidance in light of lessons learned
3.1Introduction
As part of the Task 1 review, all the schema elements will be evaluated in light of the lessons learned from the first cycle of reporting and where appropriate, modifications will be proposed which will be supported by concomitant modifications within the guidance document. For the purpose of this discussion paper, some examples have been selected to illustrate how certain schema elements might be changed to provide greater clarity and to facilitate the process of future assessment of reporting. At this stage, these are examples only for further discussion.
3.2PFRA/APSFR
3.2.1Example 1 - Review ‘data not available’ option
One of the lessons learned from the first cycle for PFRA/APSFR related to situations where information was not available or readily derivable for past floods that occurred before 22 December 2011. A shown in the schema sketch below taken from the User Guide[1], summary text with a description could be provided for each event. The detailed and structured data on flood events specified in the schema included, source (mandatory), mechanism and characteristics and adverse consequences of flooding. The location, data, duration and other statistics of the flood events were also required.
As specified in the Reporting Guidance[2]where data is not available or readily derivable for past floods that occurred before the 22nd of December 2011, summary text with a description shall be provided for each event. A total of 18,153 historic flood events were reported: 15,660 with data on the flood event, 2,493 with no data. However, in many cases the textual description of the flood event (which was required when the “no data” option was used) contained the detail requested for each event. In terms of obtaining statistical information on historic flood events at the EU level and the subsequent assessment reporting against the requirements of the Floods Directive, it would have been more efficient if all flood event data could have been reported using the structure and elements defined in the schema.
It was recommended that for any future reporting on flood events that the “no-data” option is no longer used by MS and should be replaced by the structured information requested in the schema: in most cases at least some of the required information seems to be available.
Only a relatively simple adaptation to the Schema is required in this case with some additional guidance text required for the revised reporting guidance.
3.2.2Example 2–Clarification on assessment of risk based on historical floods
Article 4.2 of the Directive states that the assessment of potential flood risks should include4:
- a description of the floods which have occurred in the past and which had significant adverse impacts on human health, the environment, cultural heritage and economic activity and for which thelikelihood of similar future events is still relevant (Article 4.2.b). This description was to be summarised by Member States in schema element “PastAdverseConsequences”.
- a description of the significant floods which have occurred in the past, where significant adverse consequences of similar future events might be envisaged (Article 4.2.c). This description was to be summarised in schema element “SignificantAdverseConsequences”.
- an assessment of the potential adverse consequences of future floods for human health, the environment, cultural heritage and economic activity Article 4.2.d)taking into account as far as possible issues such as topography, the position of the watercourses and their general hydrological and geo-morphological characteristics, including floodplains as natural retention areas, the effectiveness of existing man-made flood defence infrastructures, the position of populated areas, areas of economic activity and long-term developments including impacts of climate change on the occurrence of floods. This assessment was to be summarised in schema element “PotentialAdverseConsequences”.
It became apparent during the assessment of the PFRAs that the meaning and the differences betweenthe first 2 bullet points (Article 4.2b and 4.2c) were not clear to those reporting and also to those undertaking the checking and assessments of MS reports.
It was recommended that for any future reporting on these elements that a clear understanding is reached as to what is meant by the respective Article and what is expected to be reported for these elements.
Possible changes to the schema “PastAdverseConsequences”(see above)are shown below. The example Schema sketch is in the format of the schema sketches used within the WFD reporting guidance document. As mentioned in Section 2.1.4, the description of the schema elements will be an important component of the guidance. The schema sketch includes: the respective schema element name; the field type or facet of the element (such as string length, up to a certain number of characters but restricted e.g. from 3 to 42, or an enumeration list, closed questions yes/no/partial); some guidance regarding the schema element (for example,whether it is required, conditional or optional, its multiplicity by means of the minimum and maximum occurrence – minOccur and maxOccur, any related or supporting information that should also be reported and the content of enumeration lists), and; a brief description of any associated quality checks.
Within the text of the revised reporting guidance document,a clear explanation of the difference between the requirements of Article 4.2b and 4.2c will be provided to eliminate any ambiguity.
3.3FHRMs
3.3.1Example 1 - Sources of flooding
The lessons learned from the reporting and assessment of the flood hazard and flood risk mapping identified a number of recommendations for future reporting. One key finding was the need to provide more clarity on the sources of flooding included within the national maps.
The FloodHazardMaps elements of the FHRM schema should contain thedata related to the content of the national maps that can be used with the visualisation of the maps at the European scale on the WISE Floods Viewer. Member States (MS) should report the sources of floods associated with the maps. However, this was not always the case with certain Member States not reporting the source of floods for its maps. In another example, one MS stated that only fluvial maps were being reported even though it subsequently became apparent that the maps showed no specific sources and were for flooding in general (the maps were produced from the assessment of all relevant sources - fluvial, pluvial, seawater and floods from artificial water bearing infrastructure, in the mapped areas).
It was therefore recommended that the source(s) of flood associated with the reported national maps should be clearly reported. Where maps depict combined sources of flood this should be clearly indicated (by providing another option in the enumeration list within the reporting schema) with the specific sources that have been assessed and combined in the map.
The schema sketch provided in the User Guide to the Floods Reporting Schemas is provided below.
The enumeration list Values A11 to A17 refers to fluvial, pluvial, groundwater, sea water, artificial water-bearing infrastructure, other (can include tsunamis) and no data available on the source of flooding respectively. Therefore addition of “A12 specific maps” and “A13 Combined maps” with associated explanatory text provided within the schema and within the text of the guidance document would provide a relatively straightforward solution.
3.3.2Example 2 - Methods for calculating return periods and/or probabilities of flooding
Member States were required to report summary information on the methods used in the preparation of their maps (this was to be reported in the FHRM schema). This information was used in the checking and assessment of methods and has been summarised in individual Member State reports and compiled in an EU Overview Report. The assessment was undertaken through answering questions provided in on-line templates and summarises were provided as to whether the questions could be answered using the information reported by Member States in the summary elements of the schema.