The symposium: Cryosphere 2022: Ice, Snow and Water in a Warming World will be held in the Harpa Conference Centre, Reykjavík, Iceland, on August 21-26 2022. See: https://www.cryosphere2022.is

Plenary talks and sessions will focus on all components of Earth´s cryosphere and ongoing changes in their extent and volume: Earth's snow cover, glaciers and ice caps, the Greenland Ice Sheet, the Antarctic Ice Sheet, sea ice cover, permafrost/frozen ground, lake and river ice. Sessions will also be held on climate variations, the cryosphere in high mountain areas, Earth systems modelling, new technologies, and adaptation and mitigation efforts with focus on communities affected by cryospheric change. The symposium will allow time for panel discussions on research gaps and future perspectives. Progress towards the goal of limiting global warming to 1.5°C as emphasised during COP-26 in Glasgow will be highlighted.

In response to several inquiries, it has been decided to run parallel sessions on specialized session topics, if a high number of abstracts is received on particular topics.

The International Glaciological Society (IGS) will publish a thematic issue of Annals of Glaciology, containing peer-reviewed papers presented at the conference. Chief editor: Prof. Regine Hock, University of Oslo and University of Alaska Fairbanks.

This symposium is co-sponsored by many universities, research institutes and associations, including the International Glaciological Society (IGS), the World Meteorological Office (WMO), UNESCO and IASC.Cryosphere 2020 postponed until 2022

As a result of global atmospheric warming, all components of Earth´s cryosphere are now changing at a dramatic pace. More than a quarter of the planet´s land surface receives snow precipitation each year and declining snow cover in many parts of the world is causing concern for the future of wintertime recreation activities. Water stored as snow and ice makes a critical contribution to the world’s available freshwater supply and is essential to the sustenance of natural ecosystems, agriculture and human societies. Mass loss continues from glaciers and ice fields in all mountainous regions of the world and from Arctic and sub-Arctic ice caps. The two large ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are major contributors to rising sea-level and are now beginning to show signs of irreversible mass loss. The areal extent and thickness of Arctic sea ice cover continues to decline and the resulting albedo changes are now believed to affect winter weather patterns in North America and Eurasia. Increasing attention is being given to hazards due to thinning of lake and river ice cover and permafrost degradation, including slope failure, which calls for increased in situ monitoring and the development of new remote sensing techniques.

This symposium will bring together scientists, stakeholders and policy makers for a discussion on the latest results from studies of the entire cryosphere, which plays an important role in the hydrological cycle and the Earth System and is one of the most useful indicators of climate change. The symposium will allow ample time for panel discussions on scientific results, new technologies, research gaps and future perspectives in the light of the Paris Agreement, which calls for limiting global warming to 1.5–2°C.

Important dates:

December 2020 - Symposium postponed until 2022
10 January 2022 - Early bird registration opens
10 January 2022 - Opening of online abstract submission
15 March 2022 - Abstract submission deadline
1 May 2022 - Notification of abstract acceptance
1 June 2022 - End of early bird registration
1 August 2022- Registration deadline
1 August 2022 - Deadline for fieldtrip registration
21 August 2022 - Public session, icebreaker
22–26 August 2022 - SYMPOSIUM IN HARPA
27 August 2022 - Fieldtrip to Langjökull ice cap
27–29 August 2022 - Three-day fieldtrip in S-Iceland