Quebec Under Water: Towards Sustainable Solutions to Climate Challenges

Technical guide summary

The impacts of a 1.5 degree rise in temperature are being felt in Quebec. Flooding episodes caused by high water or intense rainfall have been multiplying at a phenomenal rate for some time now, and the province is being severely tested. Rivers are raging, breaking their banks on a regular basis and redrawing the boundaries of the floodplain, creating major damage time and time again. Increasingly frequent torrential rains are overloading dilapidated underground pipes, causing sewer backups and flooding historically dry urbanized areas.

The catastrophic scale of successive floods has been the catalyst for a collective awareness of the great vulnerability of Quebec municipalities to more intense weather phenomena, set to multiply with climate change.

As today’s exposure is not tomorrow’s, new vulnerabilities are being created, while others are growing. This makes flood risk management a real challenge for society. At a time when everything is potentially subject to flooding, we need to take concrete action to prepare for the future.

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Cover image taken from the Association des gestionnaires régionaux des cours d’eau du Québec website.