Climate Change Is Only Beginning to Mess Up Your Holidays
Anyone kicking off the summer holidays with a trip to the Mediterranean will have been greeted by back-to-back heat waves, starting with Cerberus, aptly named by Italian meteorologists after the three-headed hound of Hades that guards the gates of the underworld in Greek mythology. This weeks scorcher, called Charon, is pushing temperatures as high as 48C (118F) in Sardinia and Sicily. Greece and Spain are also expected to feel heat into the 40s. Thanks to the climate crisis, these extremes are no longer so unusual. That raises questions over whether our tourist hotspots and peak travel times will remain so in the coming years, and how the industry will cope. This heat is dangerous one 44-year-old road worker has already died in Italys extreme heat and its likely well see more casualties. A recent study calculated there were 61,000 heat-related deaths last summer as Europe baked. But tourists can stay comfortable, for example, by taking a day trip to the mountains or sheltering in an air-conditioned hotel room. Any conversation about tourism and climate change is complicated by the fact that the industry itself is a driver of greenhouse gases. How do we continue to support something that brings people joy and provides many with economic lifelines while slashing carbon emissions? Its an urgent question one I wont cover in this piece but the issue is front and center: airlines are investing billions on decarbonization, and low-carbon alternatives, such as train travel, are becoming more popular as governments push them. Tourism accounted for 7.6% of global gross domestic product in 2022, down from 10.4% in 2019, though some countries, such as the Maldives and Greece, are particularly exposed 28% and 25%, respectively, of their gross domestic product comes from tourism. Pausing international travel during the Covid-19 pandemic brought some benefits, such as cleaner air and water to some areas. But the economic losses also deepened poverty in particularly vulnerable places such as Bangladesh and Uganda, leading to increased animal poaching and deforestation during lockdowns. So its important to look at how a changing climate might shift tourism patterns, affect local businesses and potentially derail sustainable development. How are things changing? People dont seem to have been put off traveling this year. My colleague Andrea Felsted wrote recently that airlines, hotels and tour operators are facing another sizzling summer of travel, with Ryanair Holdings Plc, a specialist in short-haul hops around Europe, reporting record passenger numbers for June. The biggest pressures for now may come from good weather back at home, meaning holidaymakers avoid going abroad, and the cost-of-living crisis. Theres also been a shift toward avoiding peak seasons to cut costs. That may now be driven by finances, but with oppressive, dangerous heat events set to become more intense and frequent, early fall and spring could become even more popular. One study looking at the effects of climate change on the Holiday Climate Index a measure of favorable tourist weather found that locations such as Antalya, Turkey, would become dangerously hot in the summer months by the end of the century, with the weather in the shoulder season being more desirable. Summer travelers may instead increasingly look to cooler climes, or alternatives to typical beach and city escapes such as mountainous regions. Adventure travel is a growing sector, projected to expand at a compound annual rate of 15.2% from 2022 to 2030. But these trips are also being affected by climate change, from more frequent wildfires to unpredictable snowfall and intensifying rainy seasons. Tour operators and guides are under pressure to deal with new risks and heightened unpredictability. While theyve always worked hard on safety, many are now having to deal with more unpredictable conditions in all seasons. One operator in Argentina said in an email that, although the Andes is a challenge all year round, the summer rains during the northern hemisphere winter are becoming more extreme and making roads more difficult to pass through. In the Alps, the crisis is making mountaineering more dangerous, due to rocks coming loose as ice melts. At the extreme adventure tourism end, Nepals head of tourism blamed climate change for making 2023 one of the deadliest years on record for climbing Mt. Everest. The climate crisis is messing up winters too. A lot has been written about ski resorts and the lack of snow. I visited Scotland in February to do some winter walking, but the freezing point was much higher than it normally would be for that time of year, meaning our guide had to go further up to find good snow to teach us vital skills. At the summit of one mountain, two experienced climbers remarked how sad and unusual it was that there was no need for crampons. Its not hard to imagine the winter season being drastically reduced in the future, and either reducing the amount of available winter guiding work or pushing everyone to get up into the mountains for the brief period conditions are right. The key is flexibility. Ski resorts have been trying to become four-season destinations for years, but the importance of that is shifting as winter snow becomes less reliable: It used to be a nice-to-have for resorts, something to aspire to for a business reason, Christina Beckmann, co-founder of Tomorrows Air and vice-president of the Adventure Travel Trade Association, explained to me. Now its an imperative. The tourism industry isnt going to change overnight there are reasons other than climate for why people travel when they do, such as school holidays, second properties and family reunions but it will, undoubtedly, be altered. The industry will need to be ready to adapt. More From Bloomberg Opinion: Hiroshima Is the Place You Must Visit in Japan: Howard Chua-Eoan Good Luck Making It to Your Vacation This Summer: Andrea Felsted Holiday Air Traffic Was Awful. Who Should Be Blamed?: Editorial This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners. Lara Williams is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering climate change. More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com/opinion 2023 Bloomberg L.P.