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Hubbard glacier, Alaska

2 – 13 December 2019, Madrid, Spain

The Climate Change Conference

The UN Climate Change Conference 2019 will be held in Madrid in December. The UN Climate Change Conferences are annual events held under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, an international treaty which came into force in 1994.  

The ultimate objective of the Convention, as stated on their website, is to stabilise greenhouse gas concentrations ‘at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic (human induced) interference with the climate system’. It states that ‘such a level should be achieved within a time-frame sufficient to allow ecosystems to adapt naturally to climate change, to ensure that food production is not threatened, and to enable economic development to proceed in a sustainable manner’.

Conference schedule

EURAMET and Climate Observation

EURAMET is a key contributor to climate monitoring and environmental protection efforts. EURAMET’s European Metrology Network (EMN) for Climate and Ocean Observation formulates strategies to ensure the continued development of innovative measurement tools; required to support climate research into the ocean and cryosphere.

Monitoring and modelling the Earth’s climate requires the measurement of a wide range of climate parameters, and variables that need to be comparable irrespective of the individual location or time of data acquisition and the instrumentation or method used. A number of case studies are available that details the impact made by EURAMET projects on climate monitoring and instrumentation.

The collaborative research projects proudly supported by EURAMET through the European Metrology Research Programmes (EMRP and EMPIR) that contribute to helping us understand and mitigate the effects of climate change include:

• European metrology for earth observation and climate (ENV04, MetEOC)
• Metrology for ocean salinity and acidity (ENV05, Ocean)
• Spectral Reference Data for Atmospheric Monitoring (ENV06, EUMETRISPEC)
• Metrology for pressure, temperature, humidity and airspeed in the atmosphere (ENV07, MeteoMet)
• Metrology for high-impact greenhouse gases (ENV52, HIGHGAS)
• Metrology for earth observation and climate (ENV53, MetEOC2)
• Metrology for essential climate variables (ENV58, MeteoMet2)
• Traceability for atmospheric total column ozone (ENV59, atmoz)
• Metrology to underpin future regulation of industrial emissions (ENV60, IMPRESS)
• Metrology for light absorption by atmospheric aerosols (16ENV02, Black Carbon)
• Further metrology for earth observation and climate (16ENV03, MetEOC3)
• Aerosol metrology for atmospheric science and air quality (16ENV07, AEROMET)
• Metrology for air pollutant emissions (16ENV08, IMPRESS 2)

As stated by Emma Woolliams, Chair of the EURAMET European Metrology Network for Climate and Earth Observation ‘metrology has a core role to play in ensuring the interoperability and long-term stability of the observations that underpin our understanding of the climate and processes in the oceans’.

EMPIR projects are co-funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme and the EMPIR Participating States.

EMRP joint research projects are part of EURAMET’s European Metrology Research Programme. The EMRP is jointly funded by the EMRP participating countries within EURAMET and the European Union.

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