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The article discusses the development of a landslide prediction model for the North-West Himalayas region, discussing the geological conditions, triggers, and correlations between rainfall and landslides, with potential applications in assessing landslide risk and early warning systems in the area.

The article presents information on biogeographic delineation of the Indian Himalayan Region for configuring, locating and maintaining the protected natural areas . Topics include the recognition of three hierarchical regions which include biogeographic zone, the biotic province and sub-regions, its vegetation being sparse and treeless, and tits fauna including wild species as snow leopard, Himalayan marmot, ans Tibetan woolly hare.

On 7 February 2021 at 10:30 am, a huge amount of slurry material flooded the Rishiganga catchment, resulting in excessive flow along the valley. The main cause of this flood was the dislocation of a huge rock mass approximately 540 m wide and 720 m long from the main rock body, which slipped down towards the Raunthi Gadera valley floor, causing massive devastation in the areas such as Raini, Tapovan, and Vishnuprayag. This event was not expected and was the first event in history when a flash flood occurred in winter. In this study, we tried to answer two major questions which are not been explained so far that are related to this disaster. These questions are (i) why did this event occur in winters? (ii) where did so much debris and water come from?. This study clearly answers these questions based on field observations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discuss the need of strategic environmental assessment of hydropower projects in India, to meet the demand and supply of energy. It mentions needs of harnessing hydropower projects in Indian Himalayan Region for maximum economic development. It discusses strategic plan for the future development of hydropower projects.

The IPCC in its Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) described the Himalayan Region as data-deficient in terms of climate monitoring. This is a serious impediment to global research initiatives and thus necessitates long-term ecological monitoring (LTEM) across the Himalaya. Being governed by low temperature conditions, the high-altitude regions in Himalaya are more responsive to changing environmental conditions and hence serve as better indicators. We identified few Protected Areas (PAs) and selected forest core area and ecotones along the temperate, sub-alpine, alpine and cold desert ecosystems in Himachal Pradesh to establish a network of permanent monitoring plots (PMPs). Land and vegetation cover map of three selected PAs has been prepared using Landsat TM satellite data. Among the 10 PMPs, the temperate and tree line forests in the GHNP were found to have the highest tree diversity with Taxus wallichiana showing good stand density and regeneration. The soil pH was found to be higher for cold desert and lower for tree line forests and alpine meadows. Soil total carbon and nitrogen contents ranged from 1.08% to 13.37% and 0.094% to 1.14% respectively. It was observed that the herbs diversity showed a positive trend with increasing soil carbon and nitrogen concentrations. Satellite remote sensing proves to be a useful tool in an LTEM study, including biodiversity assessment and climate change research in complex terrains such as the Himalaya. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]