Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
15
Restoration of alpine ecosystems
Bernhard Krautzer and Helmut Wittmann
15.1 Introduction
50 years. Wide areas used for agrarian purposes have
been reduced or abandoned. On the other hand, there
has been widespread opening of power stations and
intensive road building, torrent and avalanche barriers,
as well as extensive infrastructural measures especially
for winter tourism. Some 40,000 ski runs, amounting
to 120,000 km in length, have been built in recent
decades in the Alps and are used annually by 20 mil-
lion tourists (Veit 2002).
All of the measures described lead to intensive
building each year, which then requires the restora-
tion of the areas burdened by the intrusion. But at
increasing altitudes restoration becomes increasingly
more difficult due to the rapidly worsening climatic
conditions. Due to cost, restoration continues to be
relinquished in some areas of the Alps, but a com-
bination of usually cheap restoration procedures and
cheap and alien seed mixtures are relied upon. The
resulting ecological and often economic damage is com-
prehensive: soil erosion, increased surface drainage,
inadequate vegetation cover, the high costs of eco-
logically dubious fertilization measures and manage-
ment, and flora falsification are some of the effects
that follow.
For 15 years, intensive research has been carried out
by various institutes to break this negative circle of
events. In various research projects (e.g. Urbanska
1986, 1997, Wild & Florineth 1999, Wittmann &
Rücker 1999, Florineth 2000, Krautzer
et al.
2003) it
has been proved that a combination of high-quality
application techniques and site-specific vegetation or
seed has led to stable, sustainable and ecologically
adapted populations of high value for the protection
of nature. Fertilization and management measures
15.1.1 Historical overview, state of
the art
Mass movement and erosion in a young high moun-
tain range, such as the Alps, are utterly natural pro-
cesses. A decisive regulating mechanism to counteract
this natural instability is intact vegetation (Tappeiner
1996). Humans have interceded in this sequence of
events for around 7000 years. Overgrazing, deforesta-
tion and technical interception over hundreds of years
have repeatedly provoked erosion, resulting in slight
to catastrophic effects (Stone 1992). Nevertheless,
many alpine regions would have been beyond settle-
ment had people not undertaken protective measures
at a very early date against the results of erosion. Thus,
a more or less stable balance was achieved in which
agrarian use and mining were in the foreground of
human interest.
With the conclusion of the Alpine Convention in
1991, the region of the Alps was defined for the first
time and borders were established at a community level.
According to this definition the Alps cover an area of
191,287 km
2
and the number of inhabitants is 13 mil-
lion (CIPRA 1998). It was the aim of this convention
on the protection of the Alps to pursue a comprehensive
policy for the preservation and protection of the Alps
by applying the principles of prevention, payment by
the polluter and cooperation between member states,
concerned regions and the European Community,
concisely to balance ecology and economy (EC 1991).
Permanent changes have taken place in the entire
region of the Alps during the course of the last
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