Community-Centric Rainfall Monitoring for Climate Awareness and Urban Flood Mitigation Advocacy

Accurate rainfall measurement, particularly at high spatiotemporal resolution, is crucial for urban flood monitoring. However, traditional methods of obtaining rainfall data are often inaccessible, costly, or inadequate for capturing localised flooding events. Low-cost weather stations (LCWS) can provide a viable solution, promoting public awareness and engagement with climate-related issues, including flooding, amidst growing urbanisation. This study shows the important role individual citizens can play in monitoring rainfall and contributing to flood mitigation measures. A total of 40 LCWS were deployed across Dublin to monitor rainfall at 5-minute intervals. The recorded rainfall data were compared with measurements from three nearby reference stations (RefS) operated by Met Éireann, as well as satellite rainfall data from the Global Satellite Mapping of Precipitation (GSMaP), focusing on extreme events and hourly scales. Various performance indicators, were used to evaluate the accuracy of LCWS relative to the RefS. Overall, LCWS demonstrated closer alignment with the RefS, achieving higher CC (0.43 vs 0.26) and Probability of Detection (POD) (0.49 vs 0.23) values, along with lower Percent Bias (14.7 vs -48.3%) and False Alarm Ratio (FAR) (0.27 vs 0.38) values, compared to the GSMaP data. Moreover, POD values (FAR values) showed a decreasing (increasing) trend with distance from the RefS, representing the spatial variability of rainfall. Additionally, citizens’ engagement was assessed through a survey with preliminary results revealing that nearly 60% of homeowners observed intense rainfall events being recorded by their stations during the study period. 78.6% of respondents reported an increased interest in climate change and urban flooding, while 57% expressed a growing interest in advocating for climate action and urban sustainability due to their participation in this project. These findings underscore the potential of LCWS in participatory monitoring and their ability to drive advocacy for climate action and urban flood mitigation.