Climate Change and Landslide Hazard

Landslides are widespread geomorphic phenomena causing annual fatalities and damage. Landslides are one of the most important natural hazards. Climate changes affect stability of slopes and therefore have consequences on landslide size and frequency. Slope instability processes can be considered as geomorphic signals for climate change, representing environmental evolution. Most of landslides are triggered by hydro-climate events. Considerable change of rainfall features can arise variations on landslide activity. Development of large landslide events is generally related to an intense phase of tectonic activity. High magnitude seismic events can usually activate landslides as large gravity mass movements. The effects of different environmental parameters, seismicity and human activities are analyzed in this paper. Increased landslide activity in this century is assumed as an impact of human-induced climate change.

Keywords:

landslide , climate change , slope , seismic , rainfall