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Program Management
The Permanent Service on Fluctuations of Glaciers (PSFG) and Temporal Technical Secretary / World Glacier Inventory (TTS / WGI) were combined in 1986 to form the World Glacier Monitoring Service (WGMS). Since that time WGMS has maintained and continued to develop the collection of information on ongoing glacier changes. The WGMS is a supporting program of the International Commission for Snow and Ice Hydrology (ICSIH). The former IAHS International Commission on Snow and Ice (ICSI) became a Union Commission of Cryospheric Sciences (CCS) and should become a full IUGG Association in 2007. The WGMS supports the Global Environment Monitoring System (GEMS) program of UNEP, and the International Hydrological Programme (IHP) of UNESCO.
The tasks of the WGMS are:
- to continue collecting and publishing standardized data on glacier fluctuations at 5-yearly intervals,
- to complete and continuously upgrade an inventory of the world's glaciers,
- to publish results of mass balance measurements from selected reference glaciers at 2-yearly intervals,
- to include satellite observations of remote glaciers in order to reach global coverage, and
- to periodically assess ongoing changes.
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Data Management
"These data are collected and digitized by the World Glacier Monitoring Service, Zurich." (from the WGMS web site)
Data Applications
Glacier fluctuation and inventory data are important variables for:
- climate system monitoring and climate change detection,
- hydrological modeling with respect to possible effects of atmospheric warming, and
- providing fundamental information in glaciology, glacial geomorphology and quaternary geology.
Contact Information
Dr. Michael Zemp
Director
World Glacier Monitoring Service
Department of Geography
University of Zurich
Winterthurerstrasse 190
CH-8057 Zurich
email:wgmsgeo.uzh.ch
phone:+41 44 635 5139
fax: +41 44 635 6841
WGMS Staff list and contact information |
