The European Geosciences Union General Assembly took place earlier this month, bringing over 15,000 scientists from across the world together in Vienna. Of the sessions convened, over 100 had a mountain focus - including 'Mountain Climates: Processes, Change, and Related Impacts' co-coordinated by the MRI.   

The annual European Geosciences Union (EGU) General Assembly is Europe's largest and most prominent geosciences event, attracting scientists from all over the world. 

This year's EGU General Assembly took place in Vienna, Austria, 8-13 April 2018, and comprised an exciting and diverse programme built from 18,000 submitted abstracts. The General Assembly's 666 unique scientific sessions together with 68 short courses and 294 side events covered a variety of Earth, planetary, and space sciences topics. There were also over 100 sessions covering a whole range of mountain-focused subjects, from mountain meteorology and glaciology to the impact of land use intensity in mountain semi-dry meadows on earthworms.

SESSION OUTCOMES | 'MOUNTAIN CLIMATES: PROCESSES, CHANGE, AND RELATED IMPACTS' 

The session 'Mountain Climates: Processes, Change, and Related Impacts' was held at this year’s EGU General Assembly for the third time, co-coordinated by the MRI.

With its six oral presentations and sixteen posters, the session was able to cover diverse regions – from the Andes to the Alps, from the Rockies to the Himalayas – and topics. Among others, the past, recent, and future changes in temperature, precipitation, hydroclimatic extremes, and in snow conditions were assessed together with a range of important processes and feedbacks occurring in high-elevation regions and potentially amplifying the climate change signal. Results obtained using observations, proxy data, and models of different degrees of complexity were also discussed, along with different methods for analysing and extracting the maximum information possible from this data. All this contributed to the highly interdisciplinary character of the session, which is surely one of its undeniable strengths. The session also underlined the need, the challenges, and also the future prospects for coordinative efforts across disciplines and across regions to assess the processes shaping mountain climates and the impacts of past and future climate change on mountain systems.

The session will likely be renewed next year. Session conveners Sven Kotlarski, Elisa Palazzi, Wolfgang Schöner, Andreas Gobiet, Walter Immerzeel, and Heimo Truhetz welcome your input and suggestions to shape it.

More information about 'Mountain Climates: Processes, Change, and Related Impacts' can be found on the EGU website, where you can browse by session.

The EGU General Assembly returns to Vienna 7-12 April 2019.