Spanning the centre of continental Europe, the Alps play a crucial role in accumulating and supplying water to the continent. Recognised as the 'water towers of Europe', the mountains host most of the headwaters of the rivers Danube, Rhine, Po and Rhone; as such, they deliver vital ecosystem services both within and beyond the region, underpinning social and economic wellbeing in vast lowland areas.
Troublingly, the alpine climate has changed significantly during the past century, with temperatures increasing more than twice the global average. This makes alpine mountains especially vulnerable to changes in the hydrological cycle and decreases in snow and glacier cover, which are already occurring.
Projected changes in precipitation, snow-cover patterns and glacier storage will further alter run-off regimes, leading to more droughts in summer, floods and landslides in winter and higher inter-annual variability.
Projected water shortages and more frequent extreme events, combined with increasing water demand (for irrigating agriculture or tourist influxes, for example), are likely to have severe adverse effects on ecosystem services, such as the provision of drinking water.
Economic sectors, including households, agriculture, energy production, forestry, tourism, and river navigation, are already vulnerable to water shortages. Climate change may worsen current water resource issues and lead to increased risk of conflicts between users in the alpine region (particularly the south) but also outside the Alps, where droughts are also expected to become more frequent.
The global climate is forecast to keep changing unless global greenhouse gas emissions are reduced substantially to keep global temperature increases below 2°C (above pre-industrial levels), which is the EU target. This target is guiding the negotiations on a global post-2012 climate agreement to be discussed at the UNFCCC climate change conference in Copenhagen in December 2009.
However, even a global increase of 2°C will still result in major impacts to which the world and Europe will need to adapt.
The heat wave of summer 2003 demonstrated the potentially severe impacts of higher temperatures and drought on human wellbeing, ecosystems and water-reliant economic sectors (such as power generation). Such extreme events have raised the national and community awareness of the need to develop adaptation strategies.
Drawing on the most recent knowledge of climate change impacts in the Alps and experiences across the region, a report by the European Environment Agency, entitled 'Regional Climate Change and Adaptation', analyses the risks that climate change presents to the region's water supply and quality. It extracts policy guidance on adaptation practice and aims to assist regional and local stakeholders in developing robust adaptation strategies.
To download the report visit: http://www.eea.europa.eu/publications/alps-climate-change-and-adaptation-2009