Guidance

Natural flood management programme prospectus

Increase flood resilience with natural flood management.

From:
Environment Agency and Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs
Published
22 September 2023
Last updated
23 February 2024 — See all updates

Applies to England

Applications for the Natural Flood Management Programme closed on 10 November 2023. The Environment Agency announced the successful projects on 23 February 2024.

Natural flood management (NFM) uses natural processes to reduce the risk of flooding. These measures protect, restore, and mimic the natural functions of catchments, floodplains and the coast to slow and store water and dissipate wave energy.

NFM measures can include:

  • soil and land management
  • river and floodplain management
  • woodland management
  • run-off management
  • coast and estuary management

In September 2023 government announced £25 million funding for improving flood resilience through a new NFM programme. The Environment Agency is leading the management of this programme.

We want people and places to make greater use of nature-based solutions to enhance flood and coast resilience and nature recovery. The NFM programme will help meet the aims of the:

The programme will build on and embed learning from the £15 million NFM Pilot Programme, managed by the Environment Agency, which supported 60 projects between 2017 and 2021.

Government has committed to double the number of projects it funds that include nature-based solutions to reduce flooding and coastal erosion risk.

Natural solutions can also provide wider benefits including:

  • enhancing habitats and biodiversity
  • improving water quality and availability of drinking water
  • carbon capture
  • boosting health and wellbeing

Government is investing in many ways to make sure we harness natural solutions to help manage flood and coastal risks.

This includes through:

  • tree planting
  • peat recovery
  • Environmental Land Management schemes

There are also currently around 144 NFM projects in the £5.2bn flood and coastal defence programme. Many of these use NFM in combination with civil-engineered approaches to reduce flood risk.

This new £25 million NFM programme complements all of these investments. It also helps support the commitment to increase nature-based solution projects.

Programme aims

The NFM programme aims to:

  • reduce local flood risk using NFM
  • provide wider benefits to the environment, nature and society
  • accelerate new and existing opportunities for NFM delivery and financing
  • further improve evidence of NFM by filling knowledge gaps

Who can apply?

Any legal person or other legal entity can apply as the lead applicant.

Likely lead applicants include:

  • flood risk management authorities (RMAs)
  • farmers, land managers and landowners
  • third sector organisations including environmental Non-Governmental Organisations - for example river trusts and wildlife trusts
  • businesses
  • community groups
  • catchment partnerships

The lead applicant needs to be based in England, but any partners and benefits of the project can extend into Wales or Scotland.

The £15 million NFM Pilot Programme showed the third sector to be particularly effective at achieving NFM in partnership with landowners and others. Collaborative projects also helped to maximise multiple benefits and bring in other private and public funding sources.

We encourage partnership applications, with a lead applicant (such as a third sector organisation or RMA) coordinating delivery on the ground across multiple sites and landowners. This can help achieve more integrated solutions across a large area as well as being more efficient administratively.

We will carry out due diligence checks on applicants to provide confidence they are eligible to receive grant funding.

Minimum requirements

To receive funding a project must:

  • provide one or more eligible Natural Flood Management measures
  • demonstrate a flood risk benefit in England
  • provide value for money
  • be consistent with existing flood and coast plans - for example local flood risk management strategies, flood risk management plans and shoreline management plans
  • undertake project monitoring in compliance with our NFM Programme Monitoring Requirements
  • have maintenance plans in place

Eligible natural flood management measures

We are looking for projects to carry out one or more of the 14 measures listed below. These can be in either rural, urban, or sub-urban settings.

Soil and land management

These techniques can reduce peak flow by slowing and storing surface water run-off and encouraging infiltration with the soil.

They include:

  • disabling field drains
  • blocking grips
  • installing cross drains
  • soil loosening activities
  • hedges and buffer strips

River and floodplain management

River restoration

This reintroduces meanders to rivers and restores physical processes.

Making a river more sinuous can:

  • reduce flood peaks
  • reduce water velocities
  • attenuate flow

It does this by slowing and storing flood water.

Floodplain and floodplain wetland restoration

This restores the hydrological connectivity between the river and floodplain, which encourages more regular floodplain inundation and flood water storage.

Leaky barriers

These are usually formed of wood but can be living trees or rock. They are either formed naturally or are installed across watercourses and floodplains.

Offline storage areas

These are areas of floodplain which have been adapted to store and then release flood waters in a controlled manner. They do this with a containment bund, inlet, outlet, and spillway. They provide temporary flood storage which can reduce peak flow.

Woodland management

Catchment woodland

This can intercept, slow, store and filter water throughout a catchment.

This can help reduce:

  • flood peaks
  • flood flows (from 3 to 70%)
  • flood frequency

Cross-slope woodland

This is planted across a hill slope. It intercepts the flow of water as it runs down the hill reducing rapid run-off and encouraging infiltration and storage of water in the soil.

Floodplain woodland

This can slow floodwaters and increase water depth on the floodplain.

This can help:

  • reduce flood peaks (0 to 6%)
  • delay peak timing (2 hours or more)
  • desynchronise flood peak
  • reduce peak height
  • enhance sediment deposition on the floodplain

Riparian woodland

This is planted on land immediately adjoining a watercourse, they can slow flood flows and can help reduce sediment delivery to the watercourse and reduce bankside erosion. They also have high evaporation losses and can create below groundwater storage.

Run-off management

Headwater drainage management

These techniques intercept, slow and filter surface water run-off and encourage attenuation and infiltration within the soil in the upper reaches of the catchment.

They include:

  • flow path management
  • vegetation management
  • grip and gully blocking

They usually work best as a cluster of features working as a network throughout the landscape.

Run-off pathway management

These techniques intercept, slow and filter surface water run-off. They can include blue-green sustainable drainage systems such as:

  • ponds
  • swales
  • large grass verges along roads

They usually work best as a cluster of features working as a network.

Coast and estuary management

Saltmarsh and mudflat management

These help to reduce and dissipate wave and tidal energy in front of flood defences and can extend their design life.

They can:

  • reduce the forces impacting on flood defences
  • reduce tidal surge propagation
  • lead to slightly lower water levels at defences

Sand dune management

This can create and maintain a natural barrier that reduces the risk of tidal inundation landward of the dune.

They also:

  • act as reservoirs of sand to nourish beaches during storms
  • act as a buffer protecting flood defence structures or cliffs behind from direct wave attack and erosion, which enhances the design-life of other flood risk management infrastructure
  • protect estuaries and lagoons through restricting the passage of storm surges and waves

Beach nourishment

This is the process of adding material to the shoreline. It is undertaken to improve or restore beach and their coastal defence function. It helps retain the standard of flood protection to the section of coast where implemented. It is a long-term maintenance activity, usually repeated annually.

Measures that are not eligible

The following measures are not eligible for this fund:

  • construction of hard engineered flood and sea defences - for example flood walls, engineered dams, artificial channels, water control and pumping installations, breakwaters, groynes, artificial foreshores
  • grey or hard engineered Sustainable Drainage Systems (SuDS)
  • ongoing management of vegetation or farmland, such as crop rotation, scrub management and changes to grazing regimes and livestock management
  • beaver reintroductions

You can use non-eligible measures alongside eligible NFM measures if they are funded from other sources as part of an integrated approach.

Project scale and design

You can apply for one standalone project or a package of inter-linked projects across a catchment or along a coast.

Each project must include one or more eligible NFM measures.

We expect the £25 million programme to fund around 100 projects of varying size and cost.

However, we anticipate standalone projects to be around £200k and packages of projects to be up to £2.5m.

Projects need to be value for money and demonstrate a flood risk benefit. The Environment Agency will assess the flood risk benefit centrally for applicants during the assessment phase.

Research and learning, including from the £15 million NFM Pilot programme, tell us NFM works best when:

  • a broad range of NFM measures are used
  • there is a higher density of measures across the landscape
  • the measures are across a large area and an integrated approach is taken with measures working together
  • consideration is given to using NFM measures across the whole system - for example from the source of the water to the places which may flood
  • designed with the natural hydrological or coastal function and processes in mind

To maximise the chance of being selected for funding we encourage applicants to design their projects using this learning. For example to maximise benefits through the design of larger scale NFM with multiple, integrated projects across a catchment or large area.

Project location

All projects should deliver flooding benefits in England.

To demonstrate a flood risk benefit NFM measures will need to be located near to a place at risk of flooding. The flood risk information for planning map and check the long-term flood risk maps can be used to understand areas of flood risk that might benefit from NFM.

Mapping (accompanied by a user guide) is available to help projects identify areas where floodplain reconnection, run-off attenuation features and woodland planting could help reduce flood risk.

From an ecological perspective, we will prioritise projects that help to improve waterbodies where ecological status is poor or moderate. The Catchment Data Explorer can be used to download information about the water environment in your area.

Improving evidence of NFM

Evidence and learning about NFM delivery and its effectiveness has grown significantly over recent years through a number of initiatives. These include the £15 million NFM Pilot Programme and the NERC NFM Research Programme.

This programme will help us to continue to improve our understanding of:

  • the flood risk reduction benefits of different types of NFM
  • how different NFM measures can best work together to maximise flood risk benefits
  • how effective NFM is at different spatial scales
  • effectiveness of different approaches to monitoring environmental, hydrological and coastal changes following NFM
  • the performance of NFM measures over time
  • different finance models for NFM
  • how NFM can contribute to drought resilience
  • the effectiveness of NFM in different types of geography, geology and land uses
  • NFM performance in large and concurrent floods
  • NFM performance in an already wet catchment
  • NFM performance in intense rainfall events preceded by a dry period
  • the carbon sequestration benefits of NFM
  • the water quality benefits of NFM
  • the benefits of NFM to ecology and biodiversity
  • recreational, wellbeing and health benefits of NFM

We encourage projects or packages of projects that will help us further develop our evidence in these areas.

Projects will be required to undertake and provide monitoring in line with our minimum monitoring requirements.

This monitoring will help to:

  • improve our knowledge of how NFM measures alter hydrological and coastal response in a flood at different scales and in different landscapes
  • quantify the flood risk and wider benefits achieved
  • further develop our NFM benefits tool which is being piloted as part of this programme

Extra monitoring may also be required to ensure compliance with other permissions, for example planning permission or abstraction licences.

Programme funding

Costs will be funded by the £25 million NFM grant in aid.

We will decide how much funding to allocate to each project or package of projects when we assess the Expressions Of Interest (EOI). This will be informed by the costs provided in your EOI. The partnership funding policy for normal FCRM grant in aid does not apply to these projects.

EOIs should assume that the programme will pay for the following project costs:

  • development
  • project management
  • monitoring and capital costs

It will not pay for future and on-going maintenance.

You should front load your spend with any installation of NFM measures in the early part of a project’s lifecycle.

Projects that have an approved full business case in the Environment Agency’s current flood risk investment programme must not seek alternative funding though this fund.

Additional funding

Whilst additional funding is not required, applicants are encouraged to secure funding from other sources to support the delivery of wider multi-beneficial outcomes.

We also encourage applications that propose a public-private funding mix. For example, we’re interested in projects that:

  • help pilot business models for investment in NFM
  • demonstrate how NFM can generate a sustainable revenue stream
  • secure funding on a scale that is only made possible through a partnership approach

Government’s policy framework for Nature Markets sets out principles that help guide the development of private and public funding mechanisms in more detail.

You can still apply for funding from this fund if you (or others) are receiving or have applied for funding from other Defra sources. However, the work you are seeking funding for must be wholly additional to anything that has been or will be funded by another route.

By submitting an EOI, you expressly agree to the use of all, and any such information provided to us to in undertaking such checks with other key Government funds. This will make sure that the same work is not funded twice.

If we find the application would result in dual funding, such as paying for the same measure in the same land parcel, we will reject the application. If an agreement is already in place, we may seek to recover some, or all of the grant funds paid to date and/or end the agreement.

Other funding sources

There are other examples of some other funding sources.

Private sources of funding include:

  • private beneficiary funding
  • private sector finance - for example Public-private Partnerships/Private Participation in Infrastructure
  • nature markets - for example Woodland Carbon Code, Peatland Code, Biodiversity Net Gain, and Nutrient Neutrality

Defra funds include:

Other funds include:

Maintenance costs

We are keen that the NFM measures that we invest in through this funding are maintained and remain effective.

Projects will need plans in place to ensure this. This fund is not for maintenance. Generally, landowners would be expected to carry out maintenance of any eligible NFM measures.

One way of funding ongoing maintenance of these Natural Flood Management measures could be through landowner application to an Environmental Land Management (ELM) scheme. Eligibility requirements would need to be met across all schemes.

Funding administration

The funding for these projects will be made as a grant using the Environment Agency’s enabling powers. This includes under Section 16 of the Flood and Water Management Act (2010).

By administering grant in this way, we will need to comply with the Grant Functional Standard. This aims to ensure that departments deliver consistency, regularity and propriety in administering government grant funding.

The Environment Agency will be required to undertake due diligence checks as part of the requirements of the Grant Functional Standard. This will reduce the likelihood of inefficiency and fraud.

The lead applicant, as the grant receiving body, will remain solely responsible for the project. The making of the grant does not imply that it is a partnership project or joint venture with the Environment Agency. Nor, will it operate as any type of statutory licence, waiver, consent or approval from the Environment Agency or fetter any discretion it may have. All and any liability will therefore rest with the lead person or organisation.

Once notified of the allocation, projects will be able to draw down a proportion of funds immediately. This will be to establish the required monitoring and to cover start-up costs. Further draw down will only be permitted after the full business case and relevant agreements have been approved.

Application, assessment, and allocation process

Stage 1 – develop your Expression Of Interest (EOI)

This stage will remain open for 7 weeks from 22 September 2023 to 10 November 2023.

Applicants have this period to complete an EOI form. Completed forms should then be sent to NFM_ Programme@environment-agency.gov.uk.

The EOI form will help you to develop a clear case for support, without the need for lots of evidence and detail. The Environment Agency will aim to provide advice during this stage via webinars and meetings.

Stage 2 - assessment

This stage is likely to last approximately 8 weeks from early November 2023 to early January 2023.

There are 3 main phases to the assessment.

Phase 1

We will screen the EOIs to make sure they meet the programme minimum requirements and align with the programme aims.

Phase 2

We will assess EOIs for value for money and against a wider set of criteria. This will assess the likelihood that the projects will be successful.

Flood risk benefits

To support value for money assessment the Environment Agency is developing a new NFM benefits tool. We will apply this to EOIs centrally to:

  • estimate flood risk reductions of NFM measures
  • quantify economic benefit consistently

The tool calculates total potential damages avoided. This is based on the water storage potential of the NFM measures, their proximity to an area at flood risk and the suitability of the location for NFM.

NFM measures need to be sited within 5km of a place at flood risk to provide a benefit. This is one of the assumptions in the tool and is based on the latest evidence.

For projects aiming to reduce coastal flood risk we will use our in-house technical expertise to quantify flood risk reduction benefits for you. This is because the tool is unable to assess these. Large coastal projects may be required to provide additional economic benefit assessment at project development stage.

Wider benefits

We will appraise the wider benefits of projects using the Environment Agency’s existing Environment and Historic Environment Outcomes Valuation Guidance.

We will mainly appraise:

  • agriculture
  • forestry
  • carbon sequestration
  • biodiversity
  • water quality
  • air quality

From an ecological perspective, projects will be prioritised that help to improve waterbodies where ecological status is poor or moderate.

Benefits gained through project level learning will also be assessed as part of value for money assessment as well as wider non quantifiable benefits.

You will be asked to provide some basic information to support our assessment of the flood risk and wider benefits of your project.

Costs

Projects or packages of projects will need to set out the costs funding is needed for as part of the EOI application. Project costs will be considered as part of cost benefit assessment.

Deliverability

Deliverability criteria will help to reduce risk to the programme as a whole and give greater confidence in public value for money.

These will include:

  • local stakeholder support
  • capability, competence and experience of project teams
  • robust governance, project management and financial controls

Our NFM Programme assessment criteria document provides an overview of the criteria we will assess your EOI application against.

Assessment panels

Assessment panels will score and shortlist the EOIs. The assessment panels will include representatives from the Environment Agency, Defra, Natural England and others. Some of the applicants who have submitted an EOI application may be invited to an interview.

We may suggest some amendments to your application. For example:

  • a different amount of funding
  • scaling up of NFM measures to maximise value for money based on the advice of the assessment panel

This will help to balance the programme.

Phase 3

Once the assessment panels have agreed a long list of project or packages for funding, a national panel will moderate the outputs.

This will assess (amongst other things):

  • the range of NFM across a range of different landscapes, topography, and geology
  • spread across England

Stage 3 - announcement

Once projects have been selected we will notify applicants of the outcome. All projects will be offered some short, written, feedback on their application.

We are aiming for a public announcement of the successful projects by the Government in early 2024.

Stage 4 - project development

This stage is likely to last approximately 8 months from February 2024 to September 2024.

The Environment Agency will require the successful projects to:

  • install monitoring equipment in line with the NFM Programme Monitoring Requirements and start collecting baseline data
  • develop designs and draft their full business case in line with the principles in HM Treasury Green Book and FCERM appraisal guidance - further guidance will be provided specifically for this programme at the detailed projects planning stage.
  • sign a grant agreement with the Environment Agency - this agreement will explain the claims process, what costs are eligible for the grant and what records need to be kept
  • progress relevant permits and consents.

Stage 5 - project implementation

This stage is likely to last approximately 2 ½ years from October 2024 to March 2027. We will expect projects to front load their expenditure and activities where possible.

Once projects have received financial approval, they should implement the NFM measures.

Projects will be required to record NFM measures on the Rivers Trust NFM Hub, to build on existing evidence from the £15 million NFM Pilot programme.

Project reporting

There will be a requirement for projects to report regularly on progress throughout. We also expect participants and their partners to share knowledge and learning.

The programme will be evaluated nationally to determine how well the projects have met the programme’s aims and objectives. This will be informed by the individual project monitoring and learning.

How to apply

Read the NFM programme guidance.

Please send your completed EOI form to NFM_ Programme@environment-agency.gov.uk. by 10th November 2023.

Email us to get your application pack.

Useful information

Read this for an introduction to NFM:

Access evidence and learning about working with natural processes to reduce flood risk:

Get help identifying where some types of NFM could be located:

Get the latest land management guidance here:

Get advice to improve water and air quality, and reduce flood risk on agricultural land:

Find out about flood and coastal risk management benefit assessment and appraisal guidance:

Check local flood risk information here:

For information about grant standards across government departments and arm’s length bodies:

Check if you need to apply for an environmental permit:

Updates to this page

Published 22 September 2023
Last updated 23 February 2024 + show all updates

  1. Added a paragraph to explain that the programme applications have closed and added a link to the list of successful projects

  2. First published.

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