Natural Hazard and Environmental Monitoring Services

Natural-hazard management in the Alps depends on knowing where floods, debris flows, landslides, rockfall and glacier hazards can occur and on watching them continuously. CREALP, a non-profit research foundation in Sion founded by the Canton of Valais and the City of Sion, provides this as a mandate service, mainly for the canton's Natural Hazards Service (SDANA). Its work covers numerical modelling of floods, debris flows, landslides, rockfall, snowpack and glaciers; management of the canton's hydrological and geological hazard maps; installation and maintenance of hydrometric, groundwater, weather, snow, webcam and GNSS measurement networks; early-warning systems; and a standby service giving scientific support during crises.

Satellite data is one input among field, aerial and in-situ measurements. CREALP has developed and maintained GUARDAVAL, the canton's natural-hazard monitoring portal, for over 20 years. It integrates more than 70 data sources, including PS-InSAR ground-displacement measurements from Sentinel-1 and RADARSAT-2 (produced for the canton by GAMMA Remote Sensing), MODIS snow-cover products and GNSS stations on glaciers, rock glaciers and landslides, and sends SMS or e-mail alerts when thresholds are exceeded. The MINERVE Rhône flood forecasting system, run by CREALP for the canton since 2013, publishes daily forecasts on GUARDAVAL; its snowmelt calibration used MODIS snow cover. For the canton's inventory of about fifty dangerous glaciers (GL² consortium with geoformer igp, 2026–2030), field observations, aerial surveys and satellite observation feed an annual risk index.

CREALP also builds databases and consultation portals for cantons, municipalities and engineering firms, and has carried out projects in Peru, Ecuador, China, Cameroon, Mali and Chad for donors and contractors including the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation and the World Bank, and in support of Ecuador's national hydrometeorological institute INAMHI.