Shocking map reveals how 91% of European ski resorts could DISAPPEAR by the end of the century...
Ski trips to Europe's mountainous regions could soon become a thing of the past due to a lack of snow caused by climate change, a new study warns. Researchers found 91 per cent of European ski resorts are at 'high risk' of having too little snow if temperatures rise by just 5.4F (3C) - the level expected this century under current emission-cutting policies. But if emissions are reduced and a rise in temperature is limited to 2.7F (1.5C) a limit set by the Paris Agreement only 32 per cent of the resorts would be at high risk. Resorts may have to heavily rely on artificial snow machines to save their ski seasons, but these come with their own carbon footprints, the experts say. Already this year, worrying images revealed , ruining the ski season for visitors. The new study was led by scientists at meteorological service Meteo-France and research institute INRAE in Paris, who created snow cover simulations based on climate data. 'Ski tourism is a substantial component of the economy of mountainous regions in Europe and is highly vulnerable to snow scarcity, which is increasing due to climate change,' they say in . 'We show that the snow supply risk to ski tourism increases with global warming level.' The study looked at 2,234 ski resorts across 38 European countries including Switzerland, Germany, France, Italy, Finland, Norway, Turkey, Iceland and the UK (particularly Scotland). The study only considered Europe, as around half of the world's ski resorts are based there and it has the largest global ski tourism market in the world. Europe also has more than 80 per cent of the world's ski resorts that have more than one million skier visits per year. Researchers looked at simulations of snow conditions with and without artificial snowmaking and under past and future climate conditions at individual outdoor ski resorts. They did not look at indoor ski resorts, which function differently and whose operations are not directly influenced by the weather. They found that if temperatures rise by 5.4F (3C) about the level expected this century under current emission-cutting policies 91 per cent of European ski resorts would be at high risk of having too little snow. Looking at individual regions, 100 per cent of ski resorts in the German Alps, Italian Alps, Apennines, Iberian mountains, Turkey and the British Isles would face high risk of insufficient snow supply. This would be 87 per cent in the Swiss Alps, 70 per cent in the Nordic Mountains, 93 per cent in the French Alps, 94 per cent in the Austrian Alps, 91 per cent in the Carpathian Mountains and 98 per cent in the Pyrenees. As expected, a less severe rise in temperatures (2.7F/1.5C) would greatly reduce the percentage of resorts that are threatened per region including just five per cent in the Swiss Alps, four per cent in the French Alps and seven per cent in the Austrian Alps. The researchers note that all these figures are without the use of artificial snowmaking. Already, ski resorts use machines that create artificial snow to extend their ski seasons, but the authors think this will have to become more commonplace. Usually such machines expose water to cold air to turn into it into fine ice crystals, which are ejected out over the ski slopes. Snowmaking will not always be able to cope with rising temperatures and will require vast amounts of energy and water to function but this would be a driver of carbon emissions. Overall, the team say their results provide a basis for producing local climate change impact studies in Europe that are specific to ski resorts. These could include maps of each one that take into account the artificial snowmaking methods and the availability of energy resources for sustaining snowmaking. 'Such information is critical for informing climate action in mountainous areas across all relevant scales of decision,' they conclude.