The famous snow-covered peaks of the Alps are rapidly disappearing, replaced by vegetation cover.. This process is called "

The conclusions of the researchers were made on the basis of the analysis of satellite images of the famous mountain range taken over 38 years.. Sabina Rumpf of the University of Basel, one of the authors of the study, admitted that scientists "

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Greening is a process well known in the Arctic, but until recently it was not studied in the vast mountainous regions.. However, both poles and mountain ranges are warming faster than other regions of the planet, so scientists expected comparable effects..

During the study, scientists studied regions at an altitude of 1700 meters above sea level.. Forests and glaciers were excluded from this list..

The data, which covers the period from 1984 to 2021, showed that in summer snow does not cover 10% of the study area.. Rumpf emphasizes that satellite images can only show the absence or presence of snow, the first signal of his retreat is a decrease in the thickness of the snow cover.. And you can't see it from space.

Next, the scientists compared the amount of vegetation using wavelength analysis to determine the amount of chlorophyll present, and found that plant growth increased by 77% of the study area..

Greening can occur in several ways: plants grow in areas that were not previously present, they grow higher and grow more densely as conditions become more favorable, or certain species common in lower regions move higher..

“A changing climate is causing these changes. Warmer means we have longer growing seasons, we have better conditions that encourage plant growth, so plants can just grow bigger and faster,” said Rumpf..

And this effect is summed up: the warmer it gets, the more precipitation falls in the form of rain, not snow..

This process has several negative consequences.. First, most drinking water comes from melting snow.. If water is not stored in the snow, it disappears faster through rivers. Secondly, it leads to habitat disturbance for species adapted to the alpine environment.. The disappearance of snow is also hitting the tourism industry, which is a key economic zone in the region..

Greening the Alps could help sequester carbon, scientists say. But the feedback loop is likely to lead to increased global warming and permafrost melting..

Snow reflects about 90% of solar radiation, while vegetation absorbs and releases back as heat, which, in turn, further accelerates warming, snowmelt and vegetation growth..

What will happen to the Alps next is still hard to predict. There is another process known as browning. So far, it is observed in less than 1% of the study area, which is much less than in the Arctic or the mountains of Central Asia.

The process is driven by two forces:

an increase in heavy rains followed by drought, and a decrease in the amount of water available to plants due to less snow.. So far, scientists do not know if this process will continue to be observed in the Alps, and intend to repeat the observations in a few years..

Recall that data from the European Copernicus satellite system showed that the past seven years have been the hottest on record.. Last year, 2021, was the fifth hottest year on the list, with temperature records recorded in some regions..