Coastal communities in the U.S. face a 26% chance of flooding within 30 years, a risk expected to rise due to sea-level rise from climate change. Michael Beck and his team at UC Santa Cruz are using NVIDIA GPU-accelerated visualizations to demonstrate how nature-based solutions can mitigate flood risks.

To speed up flood risk models, Beck’s team uses NVIDIA CUDA-X software and RTX GPUs awarded through the NVIDIA Academic Grant Program. By reducing computation time from 6 hours to 40 minutes, they are now able to run simulations faster and set more ambitious global goals for their project.

The team is working on mapping small-island developing states globally before the COP30 climate change conference in November. By visualizing high-resolution models and solutions, they aim to showcase the importance of marine life preservation and the role of natural infrastructure in protecting against climatic events.

One innovative approach to motivate coral reef preservation is insuring reefs based on their value as natural infrastructure. In Mexico, a parametric insurance policy was invested in to protect the Mesoamerican Barrier Reef, triggering payouts for reef restoration after severe storms. Other regions are adopting similar policies to protect coastal communities.

Through projects like CoSMoS ADAPT, researchers aim to strengthen the USGS’s Coastal Storm Modeling System by evaluating the cost-effectiveness of coastal adaptation options. By adding nature-based solutions like dunes and reefs, they hope to reduce future flood risks and protect vulnerable coastal regions from climate change impacts.

Read more at NVIDIA: UC Santa Cruz Maps Coastal Flooding With NVIDIA Accelerated Computing