Climate Connections: Solutions. California Turns to Holland for Flood Expertise

by Joe Palca
NPR

All Things Considered, January 14, 2008 · When you live near the water and below sea level, you had better be sure your flood defenses are in good shape. Holland is a country that knows this well; more than half of the country is below sea level, and throughout history the Dutch have constructed dikes and barriers to keep back the sea.

So it's natural that when policymakers in California looked for inspiration about what to do with their low-lying, flood-prone regions, they looked to the Dutch. And now, Holland and California share another concern: Global warming is ratcheting up the risk of catastrophic floods.

California's water problems are largely focused in an area called the Sacramento Delta. It's a flood-prone triangle of land just northeast of the San Francisco Bay area. Climate change is going to make flooding worse, but deciding on a plan to do something won't be easy. Part of the reason is that there are a lot of federal agencies with opinions.

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