DIVA is an ongoing project that implements a state-of the-art research modelling framework for coastal systems that can be used to assess biophysical and socio-economic consequences of sea-level rise and socio-economic development in coastal areas. It has been used for assessments that take into account coastal erosion (both direct and indirect), coastal flooding (including river mouths), wetland change and salinity intrusion into deltas and estuaries.
While being a model for two decades, DIVA has now turned into an open-source julia package for coastal impact and adaptation modelling. More in formation on DIVACoast.jl can be found here: https://globalclimateforum.org/diva_modelling
The first version of DIVA (Dynamic Interactive Vulnerability Assessment) was developed 2001-2004 by Jochen Hinkel and the consortium of the EU-project DINAS-COAST. The first version already contained flooding, erosion and wetland change as processes, but the data used was rather coarse. It was completely developed in JAVA.
In the following years DIVA was continuously developed and applied, for instance in the EU-projects CLIMATECOST and IMPAT2C DIVA was used to estimate the economic cost of sea-level rise. Results from DIVA also contributed to the inter-sectoral impact model intercomparison project (coastal sector).
A new version of DIVA was developed 2013-2016 within the RISES-AM project. The former JAVA-model was reimplemented as a modelling framework allowing for easy exchange of modules and databases. Thus, the new DIVA is no longer a model but rather a framework for different coastal models and their combinations. The new framework was programmed by Daniel Lincke in Scala taking advantage of a modern multi-paradigm (object-oriented, functional) language. The model got more concise and clear than the Java version without loosing compatibility with the Java virtual machine. Further, databases have been updated taking into account the most recent versions of digital elevation data, population data, storm surge data, beach erosion data and tidal data. The adaptation models for the DIVA processes have been further developed. While a simple protection model based on econometric data has been part of DIVA from the beginning new adaptation models include cost-benefit analysis for protection as well as construction restriction by the means of setback zones and managed realignment.
From 2018 onwards DIVA is used in the next generation, co-designed assessments of climate change costs in the COACCH project.
