Global warming threatens many low-level ski resorts with ruin – UN study

Many low-altitude ski resorts face economic hardship and even ruin due to global warming, with the internationally celebrated Austrian town of Kitzbuehl threatened with extinction as a winter sports resort, according to a new study released today by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

While climate change, in the form of extreme weather such as hurricanes, floods and droughts, put the poorest of the poor in Africa, Asia and Latin America at greatest risk, the study shows that even rich nations face “potentially massive upheavals with significant economic, social and cultural implications," UNEP Executive Director Klaus Toepfer said.

Snow levels in lower-lying areas will become increasingly unpredictable and unreliable over the coming decades, with between 37 per cent and 56 per cent of Swiss resorts facing such low levels that many may have acute difficulties attracting overseas tourists and local winter sports enthusiasts, the study says.

Ski resorts in North America and Australia will be affected too. Indeed, none of Australia's ski resorts will be economically viable by 2070 under a worst-case scenario, according to the study, researched by experts at the University of Zurich in Switzerland.

The findings are being presented today at the Fifth World Conference on Sport and the Environment in Turin, Italy, host for the 2006 Winter Olympic Games. The conference has been organized by the International Olympic Committee in cooperation with the Organizing Committee for the Turin winter games and UNEP.

The study cites Kitzbuehl, popular among the rich and famous, as a prime example of a resort lying at the low altitude of 760 metres, a height that will make it acutely vulnerable to declining and less frequent snow.

The research used temperature forecasts produced by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a body of some 2,000 scientists established by UNEP and the UN World Meteorological Organization (WMO) to model the effect of rising levels of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and to offer advice to governments on how to deal with the threats.

The IPCC estimates that temperatures will rise by between 1.4 degrees Celsius and 5.8 degrees Celsius by 2100 unless action is taken to significantly reduce emissions from sources such as vehicles, industry, offices and homes. Global warming is expected to be stronger on land areas in the northern hemisphere during the winter months, making mountain-based winter tourism acutely vulnerable.