Photo: Bernard Gagnon · CC BY-SA 3.0Hazard risk in Saint-Vallier is higher than in 91% of Canadian towns
Fire has left almost no mark near Saint-Vallier: 0% of the land within 25 km since 1986, 0.000% a year. Earthquakes add more: NRCan’s model puts building losses at $0.13 a year per $1,000 of value, against $0.030 for the typical town. In Health Canada’s survey, 13% of homes tested in the area exceeded 200 Bq/m³ (6.6% typical). Saint-Vallier grades D for hazard risk; wildfire is low here, so it earns no credit.
What stands out about Saint-Vallier’s hazards
Four national sources, each read for Saint-Vallier: earthquakes, radon, past fires and flood studies.
What Saint-Vallier faces
Each hazard against its own yardstick; meters run from low to high on that yardstick.
Wildfire
Earthquakes
Radon
Flood study
Saint-Vallier grades D for hazard risk
The grade weighs Saint-Vallier’s seismic risk and radon equally, and wildfire is one-sided: a high band counts against a town, a low one earns nothing.
How sure: Earthquake losses are a model’s expectation over many years, not a forecast for any one. Small fires and grass fires are largely missing from the national burned-area record.
Little of the land around Saint-Vallier has burned: 0% within 5 km, 0% within 25 km since 1986
Fires mapped since 1986 around where Saint-Vallier’s residents live, and the fuel next to their homes.
Forty years of fire maps put Saint-Vallier at 0.000% a year, low next to the typical Canadian town’s 0.000%.
Saint-Vallier’s homes have had no fire within 5 km since 1986; the closest was 16 km away.
29% of the land within 25 km of Saint-Vallier is forest fuel, yet only 1.9% within 5 km of its homes.
Shares of land within 5 and 25 km of populated blocks: burned at least once in 1986–2025 (CWFIS burned-area composite), forest fuel and grass (fire behaviour fuel types, 2026, 250 m grid).
Burn rate a year, towns in Quebec · highest of 514
Among the 514 towns in Quebec, Mistissini burns fastest (0.31% a year); Saint-Vallier is with the 145 near zero.
Each bar: the yearly average share of land within 25 km of a town’s homes that burned, 1986–2025 (CWFIS); the seven highest towns of 2,500 people or more.
Saint-Vallier shares the low band with 92% of Canada’s 2,610 towns, its burn rate rounding to nothing; 7.5% burn faster.
Bands of the yearly burn rate: low under 0.05%, moderate under 0.25%, high under 1%, very high 1% or more; towns of 2,500 people or more.
Fire danger and active fires (CWFIS)
Canadian Wildland Fire Information System: National Burned Area Composite 1986–2025 and fire behaviour fuel types (2026), Natural Resources Canada. Measured within 25 km and 5 km of each populated dissemination area; past fire, not a forecast.
No flood study is listed for Saint-Vallier
Flood studies whose area touches Saint-Vallier, from NRCan’s inventory, each linked to its owner.
Nationally, Saint-Vallier has no listed flood study; the municipality is the place to ask.
Towns with a flood study on file
Flood maps are thinner in Quebec, 45% of towns against 58% nationally, and Saint-Vallier has none.
NRCan Canada Flood Map Inventory: a study footprint touching the town’s boundary; towns of 2,500 people or more.
Flood studies don’t enter the grade; they are listed so you can open the official map for Saint-Vallier.
The inventory’s own caution (NRCan): “The Canada Flood Map (CFM) does not include every flood hazard map in Canada and may be incomplete or contain inaccuracies. It should not be relied upon as the official source of flood mapping information. Furthermore, if a map appears to be missing, this does not necessarily mean that the area has never been mapped. For the official version of a map, updated information, or confirmation of applicable regulations, please contact the local authority responsible for flood mapping.”
High seismic risk in Saint-Vallier: $0.13 per $1,000 of buildings a year
NRCan’s seismic risk model: the damage shaking is expected to do to buildings each year, on average over many years.
At $0.13 per $1,000, Saint-Vallier carries roughly 4.4 times the typical Canadian town’s earthquake risk ($0.030).
Shaking damage a year per $1,000 of building value
Typical for its province: Saint-Vallier at $0.13 beside a median in Quebec of $0.14, with La Pocatière on top at $0.48.
NRCan seismic risk model (2022): mean yearly building loss per $1,000 of value; medians of towns of 2,500 people or more.
22% of Canada’s 2,611 towns expect more shaking damage than Saint-Vallier, which places it in the upper third.
Each column: the share of Canada’s towns of 2,500 people or more in that range of yearly loss per $1,000 (NRCan, 2022).
The loss is to Saint-Vallier’s buildings alone, from ground shaking; infrastructure and secondary hazards are left out.
Natural Resources Canada, Canada’s Seismic Risk Model (2022), by census subdivision (2016 boundaries; a few 2021 subdivisions take their residents’ mean).
Radon runs high around Saint-Vallier: 13% of tested homes over the guideline
Health Canada’s survey of long-term home tests: the share above the 200 Bq/m³ guideline. · Source area for radon tests: the Chaudiere-Appalaches health region
the typical Canadian town has 6.6% over the guideline; Saint-Vallier’s area has 13%.
Tested homes over 200 Bq/m³
Over 600 Bq/m³
Saint-Vallier’s area, at 13%, is above the median in Quebec (8.2%), and 0.6% of its tests passed 600 Bq/m³.
Health Canada radon survey (2009–2011), by 2007 health region; medians of towns of 2,500 people or more.
More high tests than most: Saint-Vallier sits in a band that only 22% of Canada’s 2,611 towns share, with 4.6% above.
Each bar: the share of Canada’s towns of 2,500 people or more whose survey area had that share of tests over 200 Bq/m³.
One home in Saint-Vallier can be high while next door is low; a three-month test settles it.
Health Canada, Cross-Canada Survey of Radon Concentrations in Homes (2009–2011).
Weather and fire alerts for Saint-Vallier
Alerts for Saint-Vallier come from Environment and Climate Change Canada and, for emergencies, Alert Ready.
| Alert | What it means |
|---|---|
| Warning | Severe weather is happening or about to: act now. |
| Watch | Conditions favour severe weather: be ready. |
| Advisory | Weather that is less severe but could disrupt the day. |
| Special weather statement | Unusual weather worth knowing about. |
| Special air quality statement | Poor air, often wildfire smoke. |
Fire danger and active fires near Saint-Vallier are mapped daily by the Canadian Wildland Fire Information System; evacuation orders come from the municipality or province.
Weather alerts (ECCC) · Alert Ready · Fire danger and active fires (CWFIS)
How Saint-Vallier’s neighbours compare on hazards
The same four hazards for the places next door.
| Town | Wildfire | Quake $/1,000 | Radon | Flood study |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Saint-Vallier | Low | $0.13 | 13% | None listed |
| Saint-Jean-de-l'Île-d'Orléans 1,006 · 6.1 km | Low | $0.13 | 8.8% | None listed |
| Saint-Michel-de-Bellechasse 1,902 · 7.7 km | Low | $0.13 | 13% | None listed |
| Berthier-sur-Mer 1,819 · 9.2 km | Low | $0.16 | 13% | None listed |
| Saint-François-de-la-Rivière-du-Sud 1,550 · 9.4 km | Low | $0.15 | 13% | None listed |
| Saint-Raphaël 2,488 · 11 km | Low | $0.11 | 13% | None listed |
| Beaumont 3,188 · 16 km | Low | $0.15 | 13% | None listed |
Saint-Jean-de-l'Île-d'Orléans (low) has the heaviest fire record of Saint-Vallier’s neighbours, and Saint-Vallier (low) matches or beats it.
Radon is the survey area’s figure, so neighbours in one area share it.
Get ready for what Saint-Vallier faces
What to do about the hazards Saint-Vallier faces, and what to ask before you buy.
- Test for three months in winter.
- Over 200 Bq/m³: fix it.
- Kits are cheap; pros test too.
- Never drive through floodwater.
- Move papers and medicines upstairs.
- Ask whether your street is mapped.
- Drop, cover and hold on.
- Strap the water heater down.
- Keep 72 hours of supplies.
- Has it had a radon test?
- Ask the municipality for flood maps.
- Are flood and wildfire insured?
- Is earthquake cover included?
What this data can and can’t tell you
- Earthquakes are modelled. Shaking damage is modelled from the ground, the buildings and the odds of each quake, and published for whole subdivisions such as Saint-Vallier’s.
- Wildfire counts one way. The wildfire figure is the share of land within 25 km of Saint-Vallier’s homes burned each year from 1986 to 2025, past fire rather than a forecast, and it can only lower Risk.
- Flood studies aren’t flood zones. NRCan’s inventory says where flood mapping exists, not where water goes; the map’s owner is the authority for Saint-Vallier.
- Radon is a survey. About 14,000 homes were tested across Canada in 2009–2011, and the share over the guideline for Saint-Vallier is its health region’s, the survey’s design unit.
Questions about flooding and hazards in Saint-Vallier
How big is the earthquake risk in Saint-Vallier?
Expected earthquake damage in Saint-Vallier comes to $0.13 a year for each $1,000 that buildings are worth.
Is radon a problem in Saint-Vallier?
In Health Canada’s survey, 13% of 175 homes tested in Saint-Vallier’s area were above 200 Bq/m³, though only a test tells you about one house.
How is Saint-Vallier’s Hazard risk Grade worked out?
Hazard risk gives Saint-Vallier D, weighing earthquakes and radon and counting wildfire only against it.
Does Saint-Vallier flood?
Nothing is listed for Saint-Vallier on the national inventory (0); local maps may still exist with the municipality.
Is Saint-Vallier at risk of wildfire?
Less than most of Canada: 0% of the land within 25 km of Saint-Vallier has burned since 1986, the last in 2022, a low band that leaves Risk alone.
Seismic risk: Natural Resources Canada. Radon: Health Canada. Wildfire: Canadian Wildland Fire Information System. Flood studies: Natural Resources Canada, Canada Flood Map Inventory. Contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence – Canada.
Sources: NRCan, Canada’s Seismic Risk Model 2022 · Health Canada, Cross-Canada Survey of Radon Concentrations in Homes · CWFIS, National Burned Area Composite and FBP fuel types · NRCan, Canada Flood Map Inventory. Under the Statistics Canada Open Licence.
Adapted from Statistics Canada (Census of Population 2021, population estimates 2025, 2021 census boundaries) under the Statistics Canada Open Licence; this does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada. Neighbourhood names in some cities © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).