Only an ecological approach can tackle flooding

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/jan/15/ecological-approach-tackle-flooding

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Congratulations on giving George Monbiot a full page to address one of the most important issues of our time (Drowning in money: the pig-headed policies that make flooding inevitable, 14 January). Just when the country is beset with problems of flooding, and fears that they will become more frequent and more intense in the future, an ecological approach to water management is long overdue. Utilising the way that nature moderates rainwater runoff into watercourses, and the natural way those watercourses then carry the water to the sea, is the effective way to avoid flooding when there is "too much rain" and avoid droughts when there is "too little rain".

What's needed is enlightened policy to address flooding at source rather than the current dislocated policies that cause and exacerbate the problem. And we should also address why we allow rainwater runoff to overload our urban sewerage systems – which is why Thames Water says we need a multibillion-pound supersewer – rather than soaking away naturally. John Stone Thames Ditton, Surrey

• George Monbiot is right; Owen Paterson is wrong. But he is wrong because he is busily executing the policies of the European parliament. UK elections to that are due in May. Surely the important thing to do is to get all our MEPs enthused upon correcting the situation. European farmers form a powerful body, and it will not be realistic to try to annul the CAP. Efforts should be directed towards paying farmers, including UK ones, to carry out sensible, and not disastrous, land strategies. Bill Millar Didcot, Oxfordshire

• George Monbiot failed to mention one increasingly important factor – the building of windfarms in upland areas. Wind turbines need to be anchored and, to do this, holes need to be dug and filled with concrete. Similarly, hard standings for construction equipment and access roads need to be built. Trees which obstruct wind flow have to be removed. All of these reduce the land's natural ability to absorb water and increase runoff. Here in mid-Wales, in the uplands where the rivers Severn and Wye and their tributaries rise, there are many existing windfarms and proposals for many more. There is a public inquiry running into five such windfarms with proposals for 165 turbines, with a maximum height of 137 metres, and there are plans for others following in their wake. It is possible that there may eventually be 800 wind turbines in the area.

The building of just one of the windfarms subject to the public inquiry will involve the felling of 1,742 hectares of forest. All will involve the stripping of ancient peat bog, which traps water and carbon, and its replacement with concrete (each wind turbine needs foundations the size of an Olympic swimming pool). The building of concrete foundations for the pylons to take the meagre amount of electricity generated to the national grid will exacerbate the problems. Without doubt, this is being driven by government policy – and not just land management policy. Windfarm developers would not be interested in concreting our uplands without the prospect of subsidies for their electricity generation. David Ward Meifod, Powys

• George Monbiot needs to pause to think, and read a bit more widely. There is no evidence that the small-scale Pontbren results showing the influence of farming and land use practices on flooding can be replicated at a large catchment scale. Pour water on to a small plot and it may sink in; 100mm of rain over the whole of the Severn catchment will saturate it and mostly run off downstream (to Tewkesbury and Gloucester). Restoring rivers to their previous wild state may help those downstream of the effort, but can exacerbate flood risk upstream, and, anyway, only influences the smaller events. Flooding may be inevitable, and is a serious concern, but let's analyse it more intelligently. Professor Edmund Penning-Rowsell Pro-vice-chancellor, Middlesex University

• George Monbiot makes a good case for preventing rivers filling so quickly, and slowing their progress to built-up areas. Once water reaches the lower levels of the river Parrett in Somerset, however, it becomes a special case as it flows along a built-up duct, with overspill levels down its path. It is not a natural river and the science of the construction of the moors and pumping stations rely on the river emptying into the sea, not remaining trapped in its duct, unable to move. It is a man-made system which has worked well for 50 years and needs to maintained. We now have a situation of overspill sitting in houses where it's impossible to pump it back into the river as it is too full and can't empty. Surely Mr Monbiot would allow the last 10 miles of our river to be dredged? This water does actually need to escape to the sea. Roderic Baillie-Grohman Thorney, Somerset

• Owen Paterson might like to reflect on the 5,000-year-old story of the Prince of Chong. Commissioned by Emperor Yao to resolve the Great Flood that ravaged his territory, the prince built dams, dykes and embankments to control and contain the water within the rivers. Despite the utter failure of this approach, the prince blindly persisted, eventually earning himself banishment and – some accounts say – execution. It was his son, Yu the Great, who succeeded in taming the flood by dredging rivers and cutting channels to allow the excess waters to flood agricultural land and spare the cities. Peter Deadman Hove, East Sussex

• Government reintroduction of the European beaver would recruit a useful ally. Beavers are well known for their ecological role in flood mitigation, through their generally benign dam-building activities. Patrick Stirling-Aird Dunblane, Perthshire

• Challenges associated with fracking and flooding point to two interesting elements in the political geography of things environmental. One, they appear to be of particular concern when they arise in the south-east of England. Two, their resolution requires degrees of collaboration and joined-up thinking, and a key role for government working in the collective interest, that border on the impossible. Joe Morris Emeritus professor, Cranfield University

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