Talk:Chances and risks

Review by François Hissel

General remarks

The article is written in good English and its topic is perfectly relevant to the Coastal Wiki. Risk is indeed usually seen as a major issue for coastal management because of the increased level of risk on those regions (storm surge, high winds, erosion). This article focusses on the terminology used in this context and tries to explain the difference between chance (or hazard) and risk. This is done in a very concise and illustrative way, with a good example to explain it.

The content is correct and up to date from a technical point of view. There are a number of good references at the end. It has adequate length and is easy to read for a wide public.

Comments

In the second section (risk and return period), the unit of risk as stated (money per year) may be a little simplistic. It should be said that this MAY be a good unit in some cases (material damages), and not that it is the unit of risk in a general way. For instance, damages to the environment are also a risk which can hardly be estimated in the same unit.

Recommendations

Although informative enough at this stage, the article could be improved in some ways:

• add some references to pages describing coastal risks for a general introduction of the article
  • Threats to the coastal zone
• add some references about concrete examples of risk assessment where the distinction between hazard and risk is clearly made
  • Risk and coastal zone policy: example from the Netherlands
  • References for environmental risk assessment
  • Case study risk analysis of marine activities in the Belgian part of the North Sea