1 / 59 Table Of Content 1 Argentina (and South American Partners) __________________________________________ 3 2 Austria _______________________________________________________________________ 3 3 Canada _______________________________________________________________________ 7 4 China _______________________________________________________________________ 10 5 Denmark _____________________________________________________________________ 14 6 Finland ______________________________________________________________________ 15 7 France ______________________________________________________________________ 15 8 Germany ____________________________________________________________________ 17 9 Iceland ______________________________________________________________________ 21 10 Italy ________________________________________________________________________ 21 11 Japan ______________________________________________________________________ 24 12 Kyrgyzstan __________________________________________________________________ 25 13 Mongolia ___________________________________________________________________ 25 14 New Zealand ________________________________________________________________ 26 15 Norway _____________________________________________________________________ 26 16 Poland _____________________________________________________________________ 30 17 Portugal ____________________________________________________________________ 32 18 Romania ____________________________________________________________________ 32 19 Russia _____________________________________________________________________ 34 20 South Korea _________________________________________________________________ 41 21 Spain ______________________________________________________________________ 43 22 Sweden ____________________________________________________________________ 45 23 Switzerland _________________________________________________________________ 45 24 The Netherlands _____________________________________________________________ 49 25 United Kingdom _____________________________________________________________ 49 26 United States of America ______________________________________________________ 50 presented as a future doctoral thesis at the 1 Argentina (and South Universidad National de San Juan. American Partners) Two new joint research projects of the Geocryology Unit (Dr. Dario Trombotto ) at the IANIGLA institute, One of the most important activities in Argentina was Mendoza, were approved and will begin in 2014: 1) the thorough development of regional inventories of CMIRA, in collaboration with Dr. Xavier Bodin of the Andean rock glaciers, which were associated with Laboratoire EDYTEM - CNRS - Environnements, Andean river basins, and according to federal law to Dynamiques et Territoires de la Montagne, Université protect glaciers, covered glaciers and rock glaciers. de Savoie (France), and 2) a project with the Altai Thus the provinces of Mendoza and San Juan show State University (Barnaul), Siberia, Rusia, with the their wealth of creeping mountain permafrost. Working participation of Dr. Oleg Ostanin, Ph. D., Head of the steps in the inventory in these cases are well Department of Physical Geography and GIS. advanced. In other cases as in the province of Chubut, At the University of Waterloo, G. Azócar developed a in the Southern or Humid Andes, cryoforms model of potential permafrost distribution in the occurrences are not outstanding. Data and information semiarid Chilean Andes in his Master’s research that is coming from this mentioned Inventory are supervised by A. Brenning. submitted to the World Glacier Monitoring Service (WGMS). Report prepared by Dario Trombotto ([email protected]) 2 Austria In 2013 various activities took place by Austrian permafrost researchers regarding permafrost-related conferences in Austria, permafrost organisational issues as well as research on permafrost in the Austrian Alps. Furthermore, the Austrian Permafrost Working Group (see earlier reports for details) continued to improve collaborations between different permafrost researchers in the country. In the first part of this report general permafrost activities and events are presented in a chronological order. In the second part permafrost research carried out by the different Figure 1. In blue glaciers and in brown covered permafrost research groups in Austria is summarised. glaciers and rock glaciers or active rock glaciers (Cordón del Plata, Mendoza). Part 1: General permafrost activities in Austria While the doctoral thesis of Lucas Ruiz -about a statistical model of mountain permafrost distribution The 5th Symposium for Research in Protected Areas based on measured BTS (Bottom Temperature of took place at the National Park Centre of the Hohe Snow cover) in the Andes of the Northwestern Chubut- Tauern National Park in Mittersill Austria during the was successfully presented at the Universidad de period 10 to 12 June 2013. One of the sessions Buenos Aires, new works in periglacial environments focussed on cryosphere research (session convener of the Andes of Mendoza and San Juan have begun. G. Köck, Vienna). 50% of the presentations in this Estefanía Bottegal continues with her doctoral thesis session focused on permafrost, the other 50% on about cryodynamics. Noelia Sileo began glacial issues. Between June 11 and 13, 2013 a three hydrogeochemical investigations of groundwater and day conference focusing on Swiss-Austrian surface water related to covered glaciers and rock collaborations on mountain research was also held in glaciers in the basin of the Vallecitos river, Cordón del Mittersill overlapping with the above mentioned Plata Mountains range, Mendoza. The results will be symposium. These “Mountain Days” were organised presented as a doctoral thesis at the University of within the framework of the “CH-AT Alliance” program. Buenos Aires. Carla Tapia Baldis began with analyses The program was endorsed in October 2011 by the of the hydrological significance of cryoforms in the Swiss State Secretariat for Research and Education Espinacito Belt (32° to 32°20’S and 69°45’ to 70°O), and the Austrian Ministry of Science and Research. Calingasta region, San Juan. These studies will be The intention of this 5-year program is to provide 3 / 59 Swiss and Austrian mountain researchers an opportunity to intensify their collaborations, to enhance their visibility and to advocate for mountain research at national, Alpine and European level (for details see http://www.chat-mountainalliance.eu/de/). One of the sessions at the Mountain Days was entitled “Research on Alpine Permafrost and Periglacial Environments: Research Questions, Coordination, Monitoring and Experiments” jointly convened by A. Kellerer-Pirklbauer (Graz, Austria) and A. Rist (Bern, Switzerland). Some 20 researcher from both countries participated in this session. After overview presentations regarding national permafrost activities given by the two conveners, a fruitful discussion took place regarding possible future joint-directions in this Figure 1. Participants of the “AK Permafrost 2013” field of research. In October 2013 the annual meeting (German branch of the IPA) conference in Salzburg of the German branch of the IPA (AK Permafrost) took during the excursion at the Kitzssteinhorn (3203 place in Salzburg, Austria. This was the first time that m.a.s.l) located in the Hohe Tauern Range, Austria. the annual AK Permafrost meeting was carried out in The conference took place in October 2013. Austria. After two days in Salzburg (24-25 October), an Photograph provided by Robert Delleske. attractive excursion with excellent weather continuous was offered by the organiser on the 26 October to the Finally, in December 2013 the first Austrian CGOS Kitzssteinhorn (3203 m.a.s.l) mountain located in the (Global Climate Observing System) report was Hohe Tauern Range (Fig. 1). The conference was finalised. GCOS is a co-sponsored by the World organised by I. Hartmeyer and M. Keuschnig (both Meteorological Organization (WMO), the Salzburg and Innsbruck). Some 60 permafrost Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) researcher from 19 different universities and research of UNESCO, the United Nations Environment institutes in Austria, Switzerland and Germany Programme (UNEP), and the International Council for participated in the conference. The excursion to Science (ICSU). The report is written in German and Kitzsteinhorn was led by I. Hartmeyer, M. Keuschnig, deals with 23 chapters related to different atmospheric and J.-C. Otto (Salzburg) and focussed on rock and terrestrial Essential Climate Variables (ECVs). permafrost, mass movement processes on rock walls One chapter is devoted to permafrost (written by A. (both related to the MOREEXPERT project) and Kellerer-Pirklbauer). For download of the report visit permafrost conditions in recently deglaciated areas http://www.zamg.ac.at/cms/de/topmenu/ueber-uns/int (related to the permAfrost-WP3000 project; see . previous annual reports and further below). Within the framework of the AK-Permafrost meeting in Salzburg, the three PYRN groups of Austria, Germany and Switzerland were merged to one PYRN-DACH Part 2: Reports from the different Austrian permafrost (Deutschland, Austria, Confoederatio research groups Helvetica/Switzerland) group. Until 2013 PYRN-Austria was led by M. Avian (Graz). He was one of the eleven founding members of PYRN in 2007 and Thenationalpermafrostproject permAfrost – Austrian was in charge of PYRN-Austria since then. M. Avian