What future for our ski resorts in the face of climate change?

Climate change in the mountains

For mountains and winter sports resorts, climate change is above all a synonym, on average, with rising temperatures and falling snow depths. Météo France, over 50 years ago, has been recording temperatures, precipitation, and snow depths at Col de Porte, near Grenoble. The observation is clear: in more than 50 years,

We conclude that the temperature is rising by 1.3 degrees and snow is falling by about 50 cm in Col de Porte.

Increasingly strong influence of winter sports resorts

Resorts depend on the weather, with snow being the main attractive factor. The behavior of skiers and tourists depends on the weather and snow conditions. The weather is nice, the snow is there, and you are going skiing; If the weather is bad and snow is missing, you will hesitate or postpone your clinic. We recognize that climate change, with this reduction in natural snow cover, has already affected resorts and will continue to affect them in the future.

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Are resorts able to adapt to this change?

If you cartoonize a little, we can say that two adaptation strategies have been deployed in the resorts.

1. The first is to compensate for the lack of natural snow, by producing artificial snow, also called artificial snow. Technically, snow production means sending pressurized water into large plumes, which can be seen on the edge of the slopes. Today, all stations, especially large and medium-sized ones, are investing in this technology.
2. The second method of adaptation aims to create a diverse tourist offer, in winter as in summer or even in seasonal pavilions. Activities on offer are varied: snowshoeing, dog sledding, hiking, biking and cultural visits.

Concretely, these two strategies, artificial snow and tourist diversification, are often found simultaneously in resorts, but they should be better explained locally.

Emmanuel George’s view of the future of these two strategies:

very hard question. For snow, the goal will be to assess whether we will be able to continue production and under what weather, economic and environmental conditions.

For diversification, the option would be for the resorts to develop their own tourist offer in order to prevent all resorts from creating the same services and the same equipment.

But what is most important to me is to think about the future of these resorts, in their territory, with all the players, by thinking about tourism developments but also other economic options, new ways of living in the mountains, while preserving the quality of the environment. , in the context of climate change. It is definitely a collective challenge today and tomorrow.