BOLZANO, OCTOBER 29 – Ahead of an October 31st conference on the effects of climate change on mountains at the United Nations of Geneva, experts of Eurac Research Bolzano are collecting satellite data on snow coverage in an attempt to comprehend the effects of climate change.
“This data will be translated into models which will allow for a more efficient management of water resources and that can be applied to mountain regions world-wide. It is for this reason that they are interesting for the experts which will be gathering in Geneva,” explained Claudia Notarnicola, physicist at Eurac Research.
The UN program for the safeguarding of mountain regions world-wide, Glomos, will be represented at the conference by Stefan Schneiderbauer, geographer at the research centre in Bolzano. Glomos, in collaboration with Eurac Research and the United Nations University, is a program that allows for cross-nation exchanges of successfully tested models.
The researchers at Eurac have furthermore developed a method to understand which effects of climate change are to be made priority and tackled immediately. As explained by Schneiderbauer: “Agriculture, for example, adapts with more flexibility to changes in the climate compared to forestry… For this reason, measures taken for the safeguarding of forests are to be classified differently. These climate risk assessments have already been tested with success in Europe and will now be exchanged to the mountain areas of Southern Africa.” (SB@OnuItalia)
