Climate change, impacts and vulnerability in Europe ... - MemoFin.fr

Climate impacts on socio-economic systems and health4.7.3 Winter sport tourismThe winter sports industry across Europe attractsmillions of tourists each year, generating nearlyEUR 50 billion in annual turnover. The main wintersport destination in Europe is the Alps where 69 %of Alpine ski areas in Germany, 87 % in Austria,93 % in Italy and 97 % in France and Switzerland canbe considered as naturally snow-reliable under thepresent climate (Agrawala, 2007).Warm winters have already affected Alpine wintertourism. For example, in the record warm winter2006/2007, some low-altitude ski areas in Austriawere not able to offer a continuous skiing seasonfrom December to April despite being equippedwith artificial snow-making (Steiger, 2011).The widespread reductions in snow cover projectedover the 21st century (see Section 2.3.2) will affectsnow reliability and consequently the length ofthe ski season. Substantial reductions of naturallysnow-reliable ski areas have been projected for theAlps, for the Black Forest region in Germany and forSweden (Agrawala, 2007; Moen and Fredman, 2007;Endler and Matzarakis, 2011). Low-lying ski areasare most sensitive to climate change. Studies haveestimated that an increase of mean temperatures of1 °C in low-lying regions in the Alps will reduce theskiing season by up to 6 weeks (Hantel et al., 2000;Beniston et al., 2007).Artificial snow-making is still the main adaptationoption, covering 38 % of the total skiing area inthe European Alps and showing an increase by48 % since 2004 (Agrawala, 2007; Rixen et al.,2011). However, there are both environmental andeconomic constraints to an expansion of artificialsnow-making.212 Climate change, impacts and vulnerability in Europe 2012