The year 2025 marks the 10th anniversary of ICOS becoming a European Research Infrastructure Consortium (ERIC). This milestone celebrates the establishment of ICOS ERIC in November 2015, when the European Commission granted the status after many years of preparatory work.
ICOS provides high-quality data on greenhouse gas concentrations and carbon fluxes between the atmosphere, land and oceans, forming an essential foundation for climate science and for actions to mitigate climate change. Over the past decade, ICOS has grown into a strong community of researchers, station networks and facilities, supported by contributions from 16 member countries and the European Commission.
To celebrate this milestone, a week of anniversary events will take place in Helsinki, Finland, from 25th to 27th November 2025, with several events and closed meetings for the ICOS community. The week will conclude with the Anniversary Seminar on Thursday 27th November at the University of Helsinki Main Building. This will be a public event for all members of the ICOS community, invited guests and the general public and the registration is now open!
Anniversary Seminar Highlights
This academic event will bring together ICOS scientists, international partners, policy makers, and colleagues from other Research Infrastructures. We will look back at what ICOS has achieved over the past ten years and also look ahead to what’s next.
The full Anniversary Seminar programme will be shared closer to the event, but highlights include:
- Opening by Kristiina Kokko, State Secretary, Ministry of Education and Culture, Finland
- Juhani Damski, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of the Environment, Finland
- Werner Kutsch, Director General, ICOS ERIC “Knowledge through Observations – building a Research Infrastructure for science and society”
- Philippe Ciais, Researcher, Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l’Environnement Université Paris Saclay (LSCE) “Do we have the observations to detect emerging carbon losses in natural reservoirs?”
- Petteri Taalas, Director General, Finnish Meteorological Institute (FMI), former Secretary General, World Meteorological Organization (WMO)
- Presentation of the ICOS Ingeborg Levin Early Career Scientist Award 2025
- Hannele Korhonen, Director General elect, ICOS ERIC “Perspectives for the next decade of ICOS”
More information about the events can be found on https://www.icos-cp.eu/ICOS10
Registration is required for all days. Please RSVP by 9th November 2025
For the internal community, information about the preceding days – Info Day, General Assembly, Monitoring Station Assemblies – will be shared through the usual channels.
We look forward to celebrating ICOS with you!