From 3 to 8 May, geoscientists from all over the world gathered once again in Vienna for the General Assembly of the European Geosciences Union (EGU). This year marked the 20th anniversary of the conference at its permanent venue in Vienna; prior to this, the conference had been held at various locations. The EGU and the City of Vienna took this as an opportunity to commission a temporary mural on a building in the Kagran district during the conference.
The permanent venue had become necessary due to the growing number of participants, which many venues could no longer accommodate. In 2026, the EGU had almost 22,500 participants, over 20,000 of whom were on-site, and around 20,200 presentations were delivered in various formats.
A mural being painted on a house front in Vienna Kagran to celebrate the 20th anniversary of EGU in Vienna.
Five staff members and a PhD student from the ICWRGC travelled to Vienna this year to help organise thematic sessions and splinter meetings (discussion forums) and to present their work.
Dr Matthias Zink and Dr Wolfgang Korres represented the ISMN and co-organised a session on in-situ soil moisture measurements, as well as a splinter meeting for ISMN users and data providers. They also gave two presentations on the ISMN.
Group picture of ICWRGC team members.
Dr Layla Hashweh helped coordinating two sessions focusing on African-European joint projects and the equitable management of water resources in the context of climate change. Both sessions were closely linked to the SASSCAL and WASCAL educational programmes, as well as the Co-HYDIM-SA project, on which ICWRGC PhD student Tuuliki Kandjinga presented a poster. Dr Hashweh also gave a presentation in which she highlighted the important role of African PhD students’ visits to German host universities as part of the SASSCAL project.
ICWRGC PhD student Tuuliki Kadjinga presenting her poster.
ICWRGC Director Dr Stephan Dietrich and Dr Moritz Heinle presented the UNESCO-IHP International Initiative on Water Quality (IIWQ) with a poster and organised a splinter meeting on the topic. For EGU 2027, the IIWQ is planning a major Union Symposium on the use of satellite remote sensing in operational water quality monitoring; preparations for this were initiated with the splinter meeting and further discussions with the EGU sub-groups ESSI (Earth & Space Science Informatics) and HS (Hydrological Sciences).
Furthermore, Dr Dietrich gave a presentation on opportunities for cooperation between the ESSI sub-group and WMO and UNESCO, and organised a splinter meeting of the UNESCO-IHP flagship initiative FRIEND-Water together with partners.
In addition, there were numerous other discussions with both long-standing and new partners, making sure that the EGU General Assembly will continue to feature prominently in the ICWRGC calendar in 2027.
ICWRGC team member Layla Hashweh at one of the sessions she helped to convene.
