Flood protection call for UK utilities

The Press Association (UK): A national effort is needed to tackle the vulnerability of buildings such as power stations and hospitals to flooding, the Environment Agency has warned. Almost a year on from last summer's devastating floods the agency said government, local authorities and utility companies still needed to work together to address the threat to critical infrastructure.

The Environment Agency also urged people to take responsibility for protecting themselves and homes from flooding, signing up to warning schemes and taking steps to prepare - especially as floods may be come more common with climate change. And it said urgent action was required to sort out who is responsible for surface water flooding - the cause of much of the damage in parts of the country last summer after the wettest May to June on record.

The Environment Agency said that in the 12 months since the widespread flooding in June and July 2007, it had completed 34 flood defences to increase protection to more than 30,000 homes. Agency officials had inspected 5,300 miles of defences, and spent £5 million on repairing those which were damaged last summer including ones in Upton, Sedgeberrow and Grimsby....

Electric transmission lines (location unknown, but probably not the UK -- apologies), shot by "Guam"and uploaded by Nixdorf, Wikimedia Commons, under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation license, Version 1.2 or