Exmouth's flood defences completed

'But don't ignore climate change'

Exmouth’s new flood defences don’t mean people can ignore climate change, according to one of the town's councillors.

East Devon District Council (EDDC) and the Environment Agency have now completed the Exmouth tidal defence scheme at a cost of £12 million. It should reduce the risk of flooding to over 1,400 homes.

Wall-strengthening and 26 new flood gates introduced over the past three years have cut the risk from a four per cent chance of flooding every year to 0.5 per cent.  Further improvements shouldn't be needed before 2045.

EDDC and Exmouth councillor Olly Davey (Green, Exmouth Town) welcomed the installation. “This shows the Environment Agency are taking sea levels rising seriously,” he said.

“However this doesn’t mean we can ignore climate change, we have to deal with the real issue, we cannot just keep adapting”.

Cllr Geoff Jung (Independent, East Devon Alliance, Woodbury and Lympstone) said “the protection of people’s houses, shops and businesses from flooding is a key objective of East Devon District Council`s initiative on combating the effects of climate change.”

The new gates will be operated by volunteers, whilst the Esplanade gates continue to be controlled by East Devon District Council.

When the risk of flooding is high, the volunteers will receive an alert from the Environment Agency’s flood warning team.  Although flood gates can be open and closed by just two volunteers, he more that respond, the faster defences will be in place.