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Tier-based approaches for landslide susceptibility assessment in Europe

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Abstract

In the framework of the European Soil Thematic Strategy and the associated proposal of a Framework Directive on the protection and sustainable use of soil, landslides were recognised as a soil threat requiring specific strategies for priority area identification, spatial hazard assessment and management. This contribution outlines the general specifications for nested, Tier-based geographical landslide zonings at small spatial scales to identify priority areas susceptible to landslides (Tier 1) and to perform quantitative susceptibility evaluations within these (Tier 2). A heuristic, synoptic-scale Tier 1 assessment exploiting a reduced set of geoenvironmental factors derived from common pan-European data sources is proposed for the European Union and adjacent countries. Evaluation of the susceptibility estimate with national-level landslide inventory data suggests that a zonation of Europe according to, e.g. morphology and climate, and performing separate susceptibility assessments per zone could give more reliable results. To improve the Tier 1 assessment, a geomorphological terrain zoning and landslide typology differentiation are then applied for France. A multivariate landslide susceptibility assessment using additional information on landslide conditioning and triggering factors, together with a historical catalogue of landslides, is proposed for Tier 2 analysis. An approach is tested for priority areas in Italy using small administrative mapping units, allowing for relating socioeconomic census data with landslide susceptibility, which is mandatory for decision making regarding the adoption of landslide prevention and mitigation measures. The paper concludes with recommendations on further work to harmonise European landslide susceptibility assessments in the context of the European Soil Thematic Strategy.

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Acknowledgments

This work was conducted in the framework of the activities of the European Landslide Expert Group on “Guidelines for Mapping Areas at Risk of Landslides in Europe” (http://eusoils.jrc.ec.europa.eu/library/themes/landslides/wg.html) and of the International Consortium on Landslides project IPL-162 “Tier-based harmonised approach for landslide susceptibility mapping over Europe”. We thank the other members of the European Landslide Expert Group (J. Chaćon, P. Hobbs, O. Maquaire, A. Pasuto, E. Poyiadji, F. Tagliavini and A. Trigilia) for all the fruitful discussions. We are indebted to D. Kirschbaum Bach (NASA) for providing the portion for Europe of the global landslide susceptibility map of Hong et al. (2007). We thank L. Montanarella (JRC) and R. Baritz (BGR) for the support. We also like to thank two anonymous reviewers and the journal editor for their valuable comments that helped to improve the presentation. FG and PR are supported by the EU-FP7 DORIS project (http://www.doris-project.eu/), EC contract no. 242212.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources, Stilleweg 2, 30655, Hannover, Germany

    Andreas Günther

  2. Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Istituto di Ricerca per la Protezione Idrogeologica, Perugia, Italy

    Paola Reichenbach & Fausto Guzzetti

  3. Institut de Physique du Globe de Strasbourg (CNRS UMR 7516), Université de Strasbourg/EOST, Strasbourg, France

    Jean-Philippe Malet

  4. Institute for Environment and Sustainability, Joint Research Centre, European Commission, Ispra, Varese, Italy

    Miet Van Den Eeckhaut & Javier Hervás

  5. British Geological Survey, Nottingham, UK

    Claire Dashwood

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  1. Andreas Günther
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Correspondence to Andreas Günther.

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Günther, A., Reichenbach, P., Malet, JP. et al. Tier-based approaches for landslide susceptibility assessment in Europe. Landslides 10, 529–546 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10346-012-0349-1

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