Installing a high altitude weather station network in the high Argentinean Andes

CRESPO SEBASTIAN

Pontresina

Workshop; Workshop on the use of automatic measuring systems on glaciers; 2011

Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research, Utrecht University, The Netherlands

<!-- @page { margin: 2cm } P { margin-bottom: 0.21cm } --> There are many serious gaps regarding the monitoring and understanding of the climate of the Andes in southern South America. Presently there are very few operational high elevation stations along this extensive mountain range, and records covering more than two or three decades are extremely scarce, outdated, and often incomplete. The lack of meteorological information from high elevation sites is a major limitation for studying the past, present and future impacts of climate changes on water resources and glaciers in this region. The Instituto Argentino de Nivología, Glaciología y Ciencias Ambientales (IANIGLA) has initiated a project whose main goals are to install a series of permanent high-altitude weather stations along the Andes and to improve our understanding of the nation´s mountain climates for local and regional assessments. The network (Fig. 1) consists of twelve stations from Salta province in the north (22°S) down to Tierra del Fuego province in the southern tip of South America (54°S) that will be monitored and maintained in partnership with the National Undersecretariat of Water Resources. Each station will be equipped with sensors of wind speed and direction, atmospheric pressure, temperature, humidity, and snow and total precipitation.