Published works

Launceston is floodprone and located within the Tamar River floodplain at the confluence of the Tamar, North Esk and South Esk Rivers in Tasmania. Launceston has been subjected to 35 significant floods since records began, with the 1929 flood considered to be the worst (Fullard, 2013). A new Launceston Flood Authority was established in 2008 to design, construct and maintain existing and new flood levees. To replace the existing deteriorated levees a flood mitigation initiative was completed in 2016 to provide Launceston with reliable flood protection up to the 200 year Annual Recurrence Interval (ARI) event (Fullard, 2013).

However, this flood mitigation initiative did not extend to Newstead, a suburb in the east of Launceston, with the suburb consequently not protected from floods. Therefore, a new levee was proposed to protect the properties in Newstead from future floods. The cost of the proposed levee was estimated to be $580,000 along with an annual maintenance cost of $10,000 (Fullard, 2016).

Geoscience Australia was funded to undertake a project to conduct a Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA) of the proposed flood levee in Newstead as a variation to its current project (BNHCRC, 2017a) within the Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC (BNHCRC). The project stakeholders included the CRC, Tasmanian Department of Premier and Cabinet, Tasmanian State Emergency Service, the City of Launceston, Launceston Flood Authority and Northern Midlands Council.

This report provides the details of the CBA of the proposed flood levee along with consideration of several other mitigation options as researched within the BNHCRC flood mitigation project.