First CEOPHECEOPAEGIS Meeting

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• High Elevations Initiative
• status and perspective

Gianni Tartari1,2 Chair of CEOP-HE Roberta
Toffolon1 with the collaboration ofGaetano
Viviano1,2, Carlo DAgata1,3, Elisa
Vuillermoz1 1Ev-K2-CNR Committee, Bergamo, Italy
2National Research Council - Water Research
Institute (CNR-IRSA), Brugherio (MI), Italy3Earth
Science Department "Ardito Desio, University of
Milan, Italy
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Background
Mountains occupy 24 of the global land surface
covering all altitudinal belts and encompassing
within them all the Earths climatic zones
(Meybeck et al., 2001).
High elevation areas (above 2,500 m a.s.l.)
represent about 20 of the total mountain area
(not counting Antarctica). http//www.unep-wcmc.o
rg/habitats/mountains/region.html
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Mountain distribution in the continent
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Why high mountains/high elevations?

• Agenda 21 UNCED, 1992
• Mountains are fundamental source of water,
  energy, biodiversity, mineral, forests,
  agricultural production and tourism
• Sensitive and fragile ecosystems
• Different pressures driven by climate change
  (environmental degradation, alteration of
  hydrological cycles, retreat of glaciers,)
• Early indicators of climate change United
  Nations General Assembly (2007) recognized
  mountains as ideal and vastly representative
  location for the study of climate change

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High Elevation areas as Water Tower

• Glaciers and seasonal snow on HE areas are the
  most important buffer to assess the budget of
  sub-continental scale surface water cycle

• HEs supply a far greater part of worlds
  population with water
• Water accumulation in mountain snow and glacier
  is favorable for agriculture due to increased
  runoff during the growing season
• Snow, glaciers and frozen soil at high elevations
  are a reserve for maintaining the river flow in
  dry years.
• Mountains are the only renewable clean water
  source in many regions of the World and a
  significant contributor to the hydroelectric
  potential

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Hydrological significance of mountain ranges for
the river basins
Comparison of aridity in river basins lowland
area agaist maen area (dot), maximum and minimum
monthly (bar) mountain contribution to total
discharge.
Hydrological significance of mountain range for
the river basins.
Viviroli, D. R. Weingartner. 2004. The
hydrological significance of mountains from
regional to global scale. Hydrology and Earth
System Science, 8 1016-1029.
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CEOP-HE current activities
To study multi-scale variability in
hydro-meteorological and energy cycles in high
elevation areas (above 2500 m a.s.l.), while
improving observation, modeling and data
management.
Creation of a global network of selected and well
representative sites located along all Earths
high elevation areas
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CEOP-HE current activities

• Data collected both from CEOP-HE Research
  Stations and other HE environmental monitoring
  stations will be organized in a synergic database
  with the final aims of sharing useful information
  to carry out studies in the field of hydrology,
  glaciology, ecology and paleolimnology.
• Achieved results will be addressed to reconstruct
  environment characteristics, and to elaborate
  appropriate models to forecast the impact of
  future climatic change.

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Metereological Stations on High Elevations (1a)
Total Stations gt 2500 m a.s.l.
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Metereological Stations on High Elevations (2)
The number of permanent monitoring sites in the
major international networks decreases with
altitude
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Metereological Stations on High Elevations (1b)

• 2500-3750 m a.s.l.

527
3750-5000 m a.s.l.
gt 5000 m a.s.l.
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Number of stations in each continent
210
114
207
34
79
1
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Preliminary list of measures
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Number of stations in each network
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CEOP-HE Reference Sites
Lukla AWS (2660 m a.s.l.) Himalayan area
Namche AWS (3570 m a.s.l.) - Himalayan area
Periche AWS (4260 m a.s.l.) - Himalayan area
Pyramid AWS (5035 m a.s.l.) - Himalayan area
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CEOP-HE Reference Sites
Urdukas AWS (3926 m a.s.l.) - Karakorum
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CEOP-HE background activities
CEOP-HE born on the bases of 20 years experience
by Ev-K2-CNR Committe
Example of results carried out in recent time
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Various scales to treat in CEOP-HE
Space
Courtesy of K.Ueno, modified by G.Tartari
HE/Mountain ranges
Global Warming
Monsoon
Aerosol
Basin Meso- 100 km 1000 km
Sub-continent
Snow cover
Weathering
Severe weather
Permafrost
Run-off
Convection
Avalanche, Flooding
Glacier
Hour Day Week Season
Year Y-to-Y Decadal
Time
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Recent accomplishments contributing to CEOP-HE

• Monsoon onset in Khumbu Valley, Nepal

Day versus UTC cross section of hourly
precipitation from 31 Mar to 27 Sep 2003. Nepal
standard time is 5 h 45 min advancing to UTC.
Date of precipitation onset (19 Jun) was marked
by arrows on the left axis .
Ueno, K., K. Toyotsu, L. Bertolani, and G.
Tartari, 2007, Stepwise Onset of Monsoon Weather
Observed in the Nepal Himalaya, American
Meteorological Society, 136 (2008), pp. 2507-2522
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Recent accomplishments contributing to CEOP-HE
The Nepal Climate Observatory-Pyramid (NCO-P) in
Himalaya
Black carbon 1-minute average concentrations and
Ozone 30-minute average concentrations during
MarchAugust 2006 at the ABC-Pyramid Observatory.
Bonasoni, P., P. Laj, F. Angelini, J. Arduini, U.
Bonafè, F. Calzolari, P. Cristofanelli, S.
Decesari, M.C. Facchini, S. Fuzzi, G.P. Gobbi, M.
Maione, A. Marinoni, A. Petzold, F. Roccato, J.C.
Roger, K. Sellegri, M. Sprenger, H. Venzac, G.P.
Verza, P. Villani, E. Vuillermoz, 2008. The
ABC-Pyramid Atmospheric Research Observatory in
Himalaya for aerosol, ozone and halocarbon
measurements, Science of the total Environment,
391 (2008), pp. 252-261.
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Recent accomplishments contributing to CEOP-HE
Energy-balance study on the Baltoro Glacier in
Pakistan
a) Calculated total ablation map of Baltoro
Glacier (115 July values in m). b) Calculated
total ablation results compared with measured
ablation in 2004 at different sites (56 points).
Mihalcea, C., C. Mayer, G. Diolaiuti, C. DAgata,
C. Smiraglia, A. Lambrecht, E. Vuillermoz and G.
Tartari, 2008, Spatial distribution of debris
thickness and melting from remote-sensing and
meteorological data, at debris-covered Baltoro
glacier, Karakoram, Pakistan, Annals of
Glaciology, 48 (2008), pp 49-57.
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Concluding remarks
CEOP-HE is an ambitious project aiming to promote
an integrate approach in the study of high
elevate areas. Looking on hydro-meteorological
and energy cycles, HE approaches will considers
disciplines like atmospheric physic, atmospheric
chemistry, glaciology, palaeolimnology, etc.
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Many thanks for your attention