Environmental Management Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words - 2

Environmental Management - Essay Example Effects of floods may be limited to either a small area or a wide area. United Kingdom is one of those countries that are greatly affected by flood over the last 3-4 years. In 2007 the country saw one of the most devastating floods in its history. This report includes the major causes of floods. Furthermore the significant risks and immediate impacts that are caused by the floods are also included in this report. Moreover the report identifies various agencies and their role in the massive flood that took place in 2007 in Sheffield. An effective environmental management system should be in place to deal with situations like flood. In this report the effectiveness of such a system is evaluated. Lastly the report contains a conclusion that includes the summery and major findings of the research. There are several contributory factors that cause flood. A particular incident of flood can be seen as a result of either one contributing factor or multiple contributing factors. Floods can be divided in two separate categories namely river flood and coastal flood. There are three different hazards that cause these two types of floods. These are atmospheric hazard, technologic hazard and tectonic hazard. Each of these hazards are actually result of several other contributing factors like rainfall, ice jam, snow melt, landslides, dam failures, tsunamis and storm surges. These factors can be considered as the major contributory factors that lead to floods. A clear picture can be obtained from the following figure. Atmospheric hazards like rainfall, landsides and ice jam are the main causes of river floods. Among them rainfall is perhaps the most important as well as most common cause. Excessive rainfalls that vary from random convectional storms to semi-predictable seasonal rains can cause flash floods as well as annual floods in the tropical regions. The areal coverage and duration of the rainfall is dependent on the precipitation. In the words of Keith Richards