Bütler runs a law firm focusing on spatial planning and environmental law in Zurich. This past March, he delivered a seminar on the legal dimensions of glaciers before Zurich's glaciology group. "It's really a sad development that in Switzerland, the climate has changed very rapidly and strongly, and the effect is very real. And we lose a lot of snow and ice each year, which is hard to take," he said. "Some 40 years ago, it was a completely different world here."