Climate Change & Permafrost
What are the critical/emerging issues to be examined?
Partners
GRID-Arendal's activities are nearly always a cooperative undertaking
made possible through collaboration with partners and donors.
The devastating disaster in Nepal are a stark reminder that the risks facing mountain communities are changing rapidly, and that investment in monitoring, early warning and preparedness must keep pace.
GRID-Arendal expresses its deepest sympathy and solidarity with the people of Nepal, the families who have lost loved ones, and the communities affected by the catastrophic flooding that struck Rasuwa district and areas downstream on 26 August.
Scientists are still working to fully understand the chain of events that caused the disaster. Preliminary assessments point to a major ice-rock avalanche in the high mountains, which generated an extraordinarily rapid surge of water, sediment and boulders through the Bhote Koshi and Trishuli river systems.
The UN General Assembly declared 2025 the International Year of Glaciers’ Preservation, coordinated by UNESCO and the World Meteorological Organization, and has established the Decade of Action for Cryospheric Sciences 2025–2034. GRID-Arendal contributed to the International Year through productions of an exhibition on glaciers, a co-publication called Mountains in Motion and actively participating to international task forces focused on bringing knowledge about glaciers and the cryosphere to wider audiences and policy makers.
But recognition must now translate more quickly into action.
“We know that the world's glaciers and mountain environments are changing rapidly, and we know that this creates new and sometimes cascading risks for communities. The science is increasingly clear. What is not moving fast enough is our collective investment in monitoring, early warning, preparedness and adaptation,” says Karen Landmark, Managing Director, GRID-Arendal
From knowledge to preparedness
The Hindu Kush Himalaya is experiencing rapid changes in glaciers, snow and permafrost. These changes can increase the risk of glacial lake outburst floods, avalanches, landslides and debris flows, often affecting communities and infrastructure far downstream.
Our partners at the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD), together with governments and scientific institutions across the region, have worked for years to strengthen understanding of these risks and advocate for greater transboundary collaboration on disaster risk preparedness across the region. The challenge is therefore not simply a lack of knowledge. It is the speed and scale at which that knowledge is translated into action.
“Reducing global CO₂ emissions remains essential to limiting long-term warming and glacier loss. Yet mountain communities are already experiencing the severe consequences of global warming. Urgent investment in climate adaptation and disaster risk preparedness is therefore critical to protecting lives, livelihoods, and ecosystems,” says Anna Sinisalo who coordinated the cryosphere work at ICIMOD before joining GRID-Arendal.
“Events like this underline why climate adaptation and climate disaster risk preparedness cannot remain something we plan to do in the future. For vulnerable mountain communities, they are about protecting lives today. We have many of the tools and much of the knowledge we need, the priority now must be to scale them up and make sure they reach the places where risks are growing fastest,” says Karen Landmark
Resources
GRID-Arendal works with partners to communicate the rapid changes taking place in glaciers and the cryosphere and their consequences for people and ecosystems.
Release date: 02 Sep 2026