Sixty flood prevention and coastal defence schemes will start construction this year to give protection to more than 25,000 homes across the country.

Schemes given the go-ahead by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and the Environment Agency include Warrington in Cheshire, protecting more than 1900 households, Salmons Brook in North London, protecting more than 1300 households, and Godmanchester in Cambridgeshire, protecting more than 300 households.

The majority of the projects in the regional programmes will be managed by the Environment Agency's national capital programme management service (NCPMS).

The full list of schemes is available on the Environment Agency website.

http://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/research/planning/118129.aspx

Environment Agency chairman Lord Smith said: "We will continue to work to reduce the risk of flood and its impacts, and this year we will begin 60 new flood defence schemes, which, when completed, will protect many thousands of homes. We are also committed to increasing the number of people signed up to our free flood warning service to over 1.1 million, and will continue to maintain our existing flood defences.”

The Environment Agency said that new estimates also showed that it was now on track to beat its target of improving flood defences for 145,000 homes by 2015.

Thanks to the new partnership funding approach, encouraging funding from external sources such as councils and businesses, more than £72m of contributions have been secured to help fund flood and coastal erosion schemes on top of the £2.17bn that Defra is investing in preventing flooding during this spending period to 2015.

Environment minister Richard Benyon said: “Small towns like Cockermouth and Morpeth became household names after the devastation and distress caused by flooding in recent years.  Today, residents here and in many towns across the country are reaping the rewards of the partnership funding model brought in to enable more flood defence schemes to go ahead.  We now expect to exceed our goal to protect 145,000 more homes from flooding by 2015.”

A scheme in Water End, York, which was turned down for funding last year, is going ahead after the Environment Agency worked with York City Council to agree a package of cost reductions and partnership contributions.

As well as the flood schemes that will progress as result of this year’s funding, the allocation for 2012/13 also covers maintenance of existing defences.

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