Habitats, such as coral reefs, can mitigate increasing flood damages through coastal protection services. We provide a fine-scale, national valuation of the flood risk reduction benefits of coral habitats to people, property, economies and infrastructure. Across 3,100 km of US coastline, the top-most 1 m of coral reefs prevents the 100-yr flood from growing by 23% (113 km²), avoiding flooding to 53,800 (62%) people, US$2.7 billion (90%) damage to buildings and US$2.6 billion (49%) in indirect economic effects. We estimate the hazard risk reduction benefits of US coral reefs to exceed US$1.8 billion annually. Many highly developed coastlines in Florida and Hawaii receive annual benefits of over US$10 million km^–1, whereas US reefs critically reduce flooding of vulnerable populations. This quantification of spatial risk reduction can help to prioritize joint actions in flood management and environmental conservation, opening new opportunities to support reef management with hazard mitigation funding.

诸如珊瑚礁之类的栖息地可以通过沿海保护服务减轻水灾带来的损失。我们对珊瑚栖息地对人民，财产，经济和基础设施的减少洪灾风险的收益进行了精细的全国评估。在美国3,100公里的海岸线上，最顶层的1 m珊瑚礁阻止了100年的洪水增长23％（113 km ²），避免了53,800（62％）人的洪水泛滥，即27亿美元（90％）建筑物损坏和间接经济影响26亿美元（49％）。我们估计美国珊瑚礁的降低危害风险的收益每年将超过18亿美元。佛罗里达和夏威夷的许多高度发达的海岸线每年可带来超过1000万美元的收益^–1，而美国的珊瑚礁则大大减少了脆弱人群的洪水泛滥。减少空间风险的这种量化可以帮助确定洪水管理和环境保护方面的联合行动的优先顺序，从而为利用减轻危害资金支持礁石管理开辟了新的机遇。