Climatic Change (2009) 94:517–520DOI 10.1007/s10584-008-9513-y

Darkening peaks: glacier retreat, science and societyEdited by Ben Orlove, Ellen Wiegandt and Brian H. Luckman.University of California Press, Berkeley, 2008.ISBN 978-0-520-23505-6

Martin Price

Received: 22 July 2008 / Accepted: 22 September 2008 / Published online: 5 November 2008© Springer Science + Business Media B.V. 2008

Around the world, the shrinkage and, in some cases, disappearance of glaciersprovide some of the clearest evidence of climate change, visible to and easilyunderstood by scientists, filmmakers and the public, wherever they may live. Yet, forsome people, the loss of their glaciers has profound impacts on their lives, influencingboth their identities and economies. This book, the product of a remarkable mix ofnatural and social scientists who met at a workshop in Wengen, Switzerland in 2004,explores these issues and many others with regard to changes in mountain areas—not only of glaciers, but also of other cryo/geomorphic features such as permafrostand frozen rock faces and with regard to ‘downstream’ impacts, including a range oftopics including the generation of hydroelectricity, agriculture, and tourism.

It is not only the current period of climate change that has influenced the extentof glaciers. As noted in many chapters in the book, the expansion and then retreatof glaciers at the two ends of the Little Ice Age was experienced and recorded bylocal people who were influenced by the changes; and this ‘indigenous knowledge’was a key contributor to the emergence of the science of glaciology in the 19thcentury. Thus, glaciology may have been the first transdisciplinary science, as impliedin this book in the introductory chapter by the editors, and the following oneby Wilfried Haeberli. Another theme that emerges frequently in the book is thatchanges in glaciers are like many other ‘natural’ hazards; while current technologiesmay be available to ‘control’ them in periods of gradual change, rapid changes mayoverwhelm the ability of societies, at any scale, to respond. With regard to glaciers, akey concern with regard to such rapid changes relates to glacial lake outburst floods,which are described in this book from the Alps, the Andes, the Himalaya, Norwayand the USA.

Rapid changes in glaciers can bring severe risks, but these have to be weighedagainst the many benefits deriving from glaciers. Primary among these is their

M. Price (B)Centre for Mountain Studies, Perth College-UHI,Crieff Road, Perth, PH1 2NX, UKe-mail: martin.price@perth.uhi.ac.uk

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function as sources of water, particularly during the summer season when wateris most needed for agriculture and irrigation, not only in the mountains close tothe glaciers, but also downstream, sometimes hundreds of kilometres away. Waterderiving from glacial melt is also an important source of drinking water, oftenbottled for commercial sale (as described in this book for Mt. Shasta in Californiaby Barbara Wolf and Ben Orlove) and hydroelectricity, complementing the runofffrom liquid precipitation, as noted in this book with regard to New Zealand, Norway,and Switzerland. Glaciers also bring other direct benefits, particularly for those whodepend on tourism, providing not only the frozen terrain on which tourists may walk,be driven, or ski, but also white elements of the mountain landscapes visited bymillions of tourists every year.

It is the gradual or total loss of such highly visible elements of the landscape towhich the title of the book refers. However, only some glaciers are on the sides ofmountains and visible from nearby or distant locations; many others are in valleys.Similarly, the subtitle ‘Glacier retreat, science and society’ does not adequatelyencompass the diversity of its 20 chapters. While all are concerned with glaciers,their retreat is often only one of the issues covered, and is not the main focus ofa number of the chapters. Nevertheless, this book has much to recommend it toanyone interested in mountain areas and in inter- or transdisciplinary research. Itbegins with an introductory chapter on ‘The place of glaciers in natural and culturallandscapes’, written by the rather interdisciplinary and international group of editors:Ben Orlove, an anthropologist who is Professor of Environmental Science and Policyin California; Ellen Wiegandt, an anthropologist working at the Graduate Institutefor Environmental Studies in Geneva; and Brian Luckman, a physical geographer atthe University of Western Ontario. This introduces the five themes into which theremaining chapters are organised—perceptions, observations, trends, impacts, andresponses—and also presents key points from some of these chapters.

Part 1, on ‘Societal perceptions: cultures and institutions’, includes four chapters.The first, by Wilfried Haeberli, describes the evolution of perceptions of, andscientific and artistic interests in, glaciers in the Alps since the Little Ice Age, when“legends about glacier advances over flowering meadows as a heavenly punishmentfor the worldly behavior of humans” (p. 24) still persisted; a theme which reappearsin the second chapter, by Ellen Wiegandt and Ralph Lugon, also with regard to theSwiss Alps, where glacier-related events appeared “as punishments for collectivesins” (p. 34). The chapter mainly focuses on natural hazards—especially floods,debris flows, and rockfalls—and how, since the early 19th century, both local societiesand the national scientific community have acted to minimise the risks of futureevents. In this continuously evolving process, however, there continue to be tensionsbetween local and centralized power and risk sharing. The third chapter, by BarbaraWolf and Ben Orlove, addresses a great variety of issues relating to Mt. Shasta.Most of these have little, if anything, to do with glacier retreat, though the chapterprovides a clear historical description of the relationships between the residents ofthe area and their mountain. The last chapter in Part 1, by Christian Huggel andtwo others, is “a physical scientist’s [sic] view of glacial disasters and the responsesof local populations and authorities” (p. 68) in Mexico, Peru, Switzerland/Italy, andRussia.

Part 2, on ‘Scientific observations: measurement, monitoring and modeling’ com-prises four chapters. Chapter 6, by Daniel Steiner and two others, shows how two

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Swiss Alpine glaciers have been mapped and investigated using a succession of thelatest ‘high technologies’, ranging from detailed drawing, photography and surveyingin the first half of the 19th century to digital modelling in the early 21st century. InChapter 7, Lisa Andreassen and four others similarly describe long-term observa-tions of a number of Norwegian glaciers, with measurements of mass balance beingparticularly relevant for the production of hydroelectricity, given that 15% of therunoff used for this purpose in Norway comes from glaciated basins. One key findingis that, while there were various periods of mass accumulation and loss through muchof the 20th century, depending on maritime/continental location and latitude, since2000 nearly all glaciers have retreated. The theme of glacier mass balance modellingis continued in the next chapter, by Frank Paul and four others, which notes thepotential of these models to be forced with meteorological parameters from regionalclimate models. The last of the chapters, by Javier Corripio and two others, is onmodelling climate change impacts on glaciers and water resources in the Andes ofArgentina and Chile. This presents a strong contrast to the previous papers: in thispart of the world, in contrast to the Alps and Norway, data are scarce, thus increasingthe uncertainties inherent in modelling such complex systems.

Part 3, on ‘Trends in natural landscapes: climate change’, contains three chapters.Emma Watson and three others present both meteorological and tree-ring data fromthe Rocky Mountains of southern Canada and Glacier National Park, USA—whichis predicted to have no glaciers by 2030. The work shows that, for these continentalglaciers, “tree-ring data can provide effective proxies for the major componentsof mass balance” (p. 148) and that changes in the scale and mean location of theAleutian Low are related to the regional snowpack. The following chapter, byMichael Zemp and others, complements those on the European Alps in Parts 1 and 2,presenting an overview and spatiotemporal analysis of the existing data since 1850,drawn from more than 670 glaciers in the case of the World Glacier MonitoringService (WGMS). Again, this contrasts with Kilimanjaro, the subject of the nextchapter, by Thomas Mölg and four others. Here, the recession started in about 1880,but was only monitored occasionally until a few years ago. Here, almost on theEquator, sublimation accounts for a significant part of glacier loss, and much of themeltwater quickly evaporates. Thus, even in the short term, those living downstreamwill only benefit little from the melting of the glaciers. Furthermore, with the lossof the glaciers, there is likely to be a decrease in numbers of tourists, who makeimportant contributions to the local economy.

Part 4, with four chapters, addresses ‘Impacts on human landscapes: resources,hazards, and cultural landscapes’. John Hay and Tui Elliott show the value of NewZealand’s glaciers for global understanding of climate variation and change, as wellas contributing to the national economy through providing water for hydropowerand other uses, as well as sites for tourism. From central Chile, Alexander Brenningdescribes a direct anthropogenic cause of rock glacier loss; mining to provide accessto copper and gold ore. Claudio Smiraglia and six others describe how changesin a glacier used for summer skiing and an ice-contact lake have influenced boththe numbers and the safety of tourists. Robert Rhoades and two others presenta summary of a fascinating study of the interactions between both visitors andlocal populations with Cotacachi, an Ecuadorian volcano that finally lost its glaciersaround the turn of this century. Mirroring past perceptions in the Alps, elderly peopleand those from remote villages believe that Mama Cotacachi is punishing them; and

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“in the minds and memories of local people, it is still a snow-capped volcano” andcontinues to be shown thus on “billboards, brochures, and tapestries” (p. 222).

Part 5, on ‘Responses, adaptation and accommodation”, has four rather differ-ent chapters. The first, by Mark Carey, focuses on Peru’s Cordillera Blanca, andparticularly the area devastated by the earthquake-triggered avalanche which sweptdown from Yungay, killing perhaps 15,000 people. Yet, for diverse social, politicaland economic reasons, and despite hazard zoning, many people have resettled in thesame places; as in the Swiss Alps described in chapter 3, there are clear tensionsbetween national and local societies (and also in the local community) and betweentechnological ‘solutions’ and other perceptions and priorities. The next chapter,by Shardul Agarwala, mainly addresses the risk of glacial lake outburst floods inNepal and Tibet for both local populations and hydropower generation. These risksare highly uncertain, and require better coordination between both national andinternational organisations, particularly to address reductions in vulnerabilities aswell as infrastructure for risk reduction. Urs Luterbacher and three colleagues cometo similar conclusions in the following chapter, on glaciers and water resources inCentral Asia. The final chapter, by Denis Knubel and two others, provides a usefuloverview of institutions and organisations around the world and concerned, to agreater of lesser extent, with glaciers. A very useful complement would have been alist of all the contributors, with contact details. Considering the book as a whole, myonly other quibbles concern the low quality of many of the photographs and maps,which were probably excellent in the colour powerpoints used during the workshop,but have not reproduced well as small black-and-white images.

Overall, this is a fascinating book which shows the need for scientists fromdifferent social and natural disciplines to work with each other and with local peopleto understand the roles of glaciers, the opportunities and risks they provide, and howthese may change over time. The juxtaposition of chapters on the Alps and on otherparts of the world clearly shows vast differentials in natural scientific knowledge,even if the benefits and perceptions in contrasting regions are often comparable.Finally, many of the case studies show that, even if we know that glaciers are meltingand have significant knowledge of the physical systems involved and the likely—if often uncertain—consequences, people will respond to this knowledge in waysdepending on their historical, social, and economic contexts. All of these lessons areequally valid for many other environments in our changing world.