The HKH Snow Update 2025 highlights a significant decline in seasonal snow across the Hindu Kush Himalaya region, with snow persistence 23.6% below normal — the lowest in 23 years. This trend, now in its third consecutive year, threatens water security for nearly two billion people. All twelve major river …
Climate warming is expected to induce treelines to advance to higher elevations. Empirical studies in diverse mountain ranges, however, give evidence of both advancing alpine treelines and rather insignificant responses. The inconsistency of findings suggests distinct differences in the sensitivity of global treelines to recent climate change. It is still …
The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has directed setting up a proposal to scientifically and comprehensively study the cumulative environmental impact due to construction of dams in Arunachal Pradesh. Admitting a petition by Pradip Kumar Bhuyan and Joydeep Bhuyan, the NGT also issued notices to the Union Power ministry, Union Environment …
“Temblor might occur tomorrow, or 50 years later, but it will hit the State” In the wake of the recent Nepal earthquake, the possibility of a temblor of magnitude 8 striking Uttarakhand has come up for discussion. A research article, “Geomorphology reveals active décollement geometry in the central Himalayan seismic …
The government has asked the Supreme Court for six months to undertake a complete assessment of the feasibility of allowing construction of six new hydropower projects in Uttarakhand. The environment ministry has said that it will file a fresh affidavit at that time. Speaking to ET, the government's lawyer ADN …
Conventional energy resources are fast depleting and therefore alternative resources are required to sustain the fast progress and development of any nation. This situation is more pertinent to India where fast growing population and developmental activities are posing major challenges to the government as the country has limited resources of …
A remote sensing and GIS based landslide susceptibility zonation (LSZ) of the Tehri reservoir rim region has been presented here. Landslide causal factors such as land use/land cover, photo-lineaments, landslide incidences, drainage, slope, aspect, relative relief, topographic wetness index and stream power index were derived from remote sensing data. Ancillary …
Miraculous pullouts of a teenaged boy and a woman alive on Thursday lifted the gloom on a rainy day while three fresh aftershocks kept people on edge, even as Nepal’s Army Chief feared that the death toll in the quake could be as high as 15,000. A long silence followed …
A scientist of the Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology, Dr Vikram Gupta, does not rule out the Himalayan region witnessing more landslides in the near future, particularly during the rainy season, as fallout of Nepal’s massive earthquake. The earthquake at Nepal which has been the result of a rupture caused …
The Nepal earthquake has necessitated the need for expanding the scope of the Centre for Himalayan Study proposed in Uttarakhand by the Narendra Modi government to further encourage studies in the Himalayan region. In the aftermath of the devastating Kedarnath natural disaster in 2013, the Union Ministry of Finance had …
Washington: A part of India slid about one foot to 10 feet northwards and underneath Nepal in a matter of seconds during the devastating 7.9-magnitude earthquake that hit the neighbouring country on Saturday, a US scientist has said. "Saturday's slip took place over an area about 1,000 to 2,000 square …
NE, Bihar, U'khand, J&K;, Himachal, Gujarat, Andamans At High Risk An assessment made by the Centre says the entire Himalayan region is vulnerable to high intensity earthquakes exceeding 8.0 on the Richter scale which could adversely affect millions of people. After Saturday's earthquake, which had its epicenter in Nepal, India …
The organic acids present in the aerosols serve as a unique fingerprint in identifying the source of pollution. Contrary to the general assumption that the southern slopes of the Himalayas act as a barrier and effectively block the transportation of pollutants from India and other parts of South Asia, a …
The Centre today constituted a task force comprising experts and senior officials to forge a consensus among states for the speedy implementation of the interlinking of rivers in the country. The task force would be chaired by BN Navalawala, adviser to the Gujarat Chief Minister on water resources development and …
The Digboi College, Wildlife Trust of India and Aaranyak, together with Digboi Forest Division successfully released a Himalayan Griffon Vulture at Rajgarali Division of Bazaloni TE in Makum recently. The vulture was found paralyzed in a tea garden. Local forest staff immediately rushed on receiving the information by garden workers …
A landslide in the Himalayan region of Kashmir buried at least 10 people while they were sleeping, police said on Monday, as unseasonal rains swept India, damaging crops and raising fears of flash floods in the mountainous north. Hundreds of people fled their homes as Kashmir's main rivers began to …
The Karakoram and the Himalayan mountain range accommodate a large number of glaciers and are the major source of several perennial rivers downstream. To interactively describe to response of glaciers to climate change, a glacier parameterization scheme has been developed and implemented into the regional climate model REMO. The scheme …
Rainfall variations in the Garhwal Himalaya, Uttarakhand were studied for a period of six years from 2008 to 2013. The rainfall data were obtained through a dense network of rain gauges installed by India Meteorological Department (IMD), New Delhi, are spreaded over seven districts of Uttarakhand, combined with the data …
Presentation by Dr. Mukesh Sharma & Umed Paliwal of Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur at Anil Agarwal Dialogue 2015: Poor in climate change, India Habitat Centre, New Delhi, March 11 – 12, 2015.
Snow depth is an important parameter for avalanche forecast and hydrological studies. In the Himalaya, manual snow depth data collection is difficult due to remote and rugged terrain and the severe weather conditions. However, microwave-based sensors in various satellites have the capability to estimate snow depth in all weather conditions. …
Glaciers in the eastern Himalayas are retreating, but this is not likely to affect river flows significantly in the coming decades, say scientists from the Kathmandu-based International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD). An ICIMOD report presents fresh evidence of retreating glaciers in the eastern Himalayas in India and Nepal. …
