The physical EGU 2020 event in Vienna is canceled - please see the online event "EGU2020: Sharing Geoscience Online".
Call for abstracts is open until 15 January 2020 and a full list of sessions can be browsed and searched via the session programme on the EGU website.
MRI sessions at EGU 2020
Co-organized by EOS4/CL4/CR7/GM7
Convener: Carolina Adler (MRI) | Co-convener: Aino Kulonen (MRI)
Chat time: Monday, 4 May 2020, 14:00–15:45
In this session, we invite contributions to explore diverse experiences with inter- and transdisciplinary research and practice, that is specifically applied in the mountain context. Taking mountains as complex social-ecological systems, they provide a concrete and spatially-defined contexts in which to explore how global change phenomena manifests and how it poses challenges and opportunities for communities and society in general.
Addressing societal concerns, and finding suitable solutions with regards to associated impacts of global change in mountains, requires and inter- and transdisciplinary (IT-TD) approach to research and practice. We invite contributions based on empirical research and/or practical experience with IT-TD, to critically reflect on these practices in the mountains context and learn from experiences that explicitly address societal grand challenges such as (but not limited to) climate change impacts and adaptation, transformations to sustainability, disaster risk reduction, or transitions to low carbon economies. We welcome contributions depicting research experiences in European mountain regions, other mountain regions around the world, as well as contributions from Early Career Researchers.
The session is led and coordinated by the Mountain Research Initiative (MRI) with expectations to be able to draw from this session as inputs for future research agendas and coordination of research collaborations in mountain regions, worldwide.
CL4.17 Mountain Climatology and Meteorology
Co-organized by AS1/CR7/NH1
Convener: Wolfgang Schöner | Co-conveners: Carolina Adler (MRI), Maria Vittoria Guarino, Elisa Palazzi, Stefano Serafin
Chat time: Monday, 4 May 2020, 14:00–15:45
Mountains cover approximately one quarter of the total land surface on the planet, and a significant fraction of the world’s population lives in their vicinity. Orography critically affects weather and climate processes at all scales and, in connection with factors such as land-cover heterogeneity, is responsible for high spatial variability in mountain weather and climate.
Due to this high complexity, monitoring and modeling the atmosphere and the other components of the climate system in mountain regions is challenging both at short (meteorological) and long (climatological) time-scales. This session is devoted to the better understanding of weather and climate processes in mountain and high-elevation areas around the globe, as well as their modification induced by global environmental change.
We welcome contributions describing the influence of mountains on the atmosphere on meteorological time-scales, including terrain-induced airflow, orographic precipitation, land-atmosphere exchange over mountains, forecasting and predictability of mountain weather. Furthermore we invite studies that investigate climate processes and climate change in mountain areas and its impacts on dependent systems, based on monitoring and modeling activities. Particularly welcome are contributions that merge various sources of information and reach across disciplinary borders (atmospheric, hydrological, cryospheric, ecological and social sciences). In this respect the session invites also contributions on outcomes of the WMO "High Mountain Summit" taking place in October 2019.
CR3.1 Risks from a changing cryosphere
Convener: Christian Huggel | Co-conveners: Michael Krautblatter, Matthew WestobyECS
Join Zoom Meeting
Time: Tuesday May 5, 2020 08:30 Zurich
Meeting ID: 979 2725 9478
All components of the cryosphere are strongly impacted by climate change and have been undergoing significant changes over the past decades. Most visibly, glaciers are shrinking and thinning. Snow cover and duration is reduced, and permafrost, in both Arctic and alpine environments, is thawing. Changes in sea ice cover and characteristics have attracted widespread attention, and changes in ice sheets are monitored with care and concern.
Risks associated with one or several of these cryosphere components have been present throughout history. However, with ongoing climate change, we expect changes in the magnitude and frequency of hazards with profound implications for risks. New or growing glacier lakes pose a threat to downstream communities through the potential for sudden drainage. Thawing permafrost can destabilize mountain slopes, and eventually result in large landslide or destructive rock and ice avalanches. An accelerated rate of permafrost degradation in low-land areas poses risk to existing and planned infrastructure and raises concerns about large-scale emission of greenhouse gases currently trapped in Arctic permafrost. Decreased summertime sea ice extent may produce both risks and opportunities in terms of large-scale climate feedbacks and alterations, coastal vulnerability, and new access to transport routes and natural resources. Eventually, rapid acceleration of outlet glacier ice discharge and collapse of ice sheets is of major concern for sea level change.
This session invites contributions across all cryosphere components that address risks associated with observed or projected physical processes. Contributions considering more than one cryosphere component (e.g. glaciers and permafrost) are particularly encouraged. Contributions can consider hazards and risks related to changes in the past, present or future. Furthermore, contributions may consider one or several components of risks (i.e. natural hazards, exposure, vulnerability) as long as conceptual clarity is ensured.
