Population exposure predicts flood losses in Sweden

The article presents a national-scale assessment of flood exposure in Sweden, combining high-resolution data on population, buildings, and inundation extents for two scenarios: the 100-year flood and an extreme highest-possible-flood scenario. Its aim is to compare population and building exposure across municipal and county scales and to test how well these exposure indicators correspond to observed impacts using insurance claims and compensation data.

The results show that exposure increases sharply under the extreme scenario: exposed buildings triple and exposed population doubles. The study also finds that population exposure is strongly correlated, especially at county level, with both the number of insurance claims and the amount of compensation paid, whereas building exposure is a much weaker predictor of actual losses. It concludes that population-based indicators are especially valuable for national flood risk assessments and for supporting more effective and equitable flood risk management.