50 The EconomistJanuary27th 20181T
HE great limestone peaks of the Dolo-
mites glow ochre and pink in the sum-
mer sunset. The slab of the Marmolada gla-
cier, the “Queen of the Dolomites”, glistens
a regal white. But get up close and the
sovereign is weeping. Countless rivulets of
meltwater stream down her face.
The retreat of the Marmolada is heart-
breaking. So is what she leaves behind:
shrapnel, barbed wire, splinters of shacks
and the other detritus of the first world war
in which Italian and Austro-Hungarian sol-
diers battled for the controlling heights. As
the glacier has shrunk, by more than half
since the war, its time capsule is being
opened. Last summer the ice gave up an
unexploded shell. Sometimes it brings up
dead soldiers, too. One appeared in 2010.
Another surfaced last summer on the Ada-
mello glacier farther west. Archaeologists
describe how the ice, in its pockets, pre-
serves not onlythe objects of war but also
its smell, from the grease of military cable-
ways to old sauerkraut.
Then there are the remains of a carefree
and careless time, when the crevasses be-
came dumps during the construction of ca-
ble-cars and ski lifts in the 1950s and 1960s.
With its highest lift reaching 3,265 metres,
the Marmolada was a spot for summer ski-
ing. That fun ended in 2003 because of ris-
ing temperaturesand costs. Much the same
is happening to glacier skiing elsewhere.
The greenhouse gases emitted since thethat the number of skier-days (visits to ski
slopes for part of or a whole day) in the
world’s main ski destinations fell from
about 350m in the 2008-09 season to
about 320m in 2015-16. This includes de-
clines in the United States, Canada, France,
Switzerland, Italy and, most markedly, in
fast-ageing Japan. The drop would be big-
ger still were it not for breakneck growth in
China, where skier-days nearly tripled in
the same period to 11m. American resorts
(usually small ones) have been closing
since the late 1980s. Those in the European
Alps, which account for about 40% of ski-
er-days, have mostly kept going, albeit
with variouspublicsubsidies.Snow country for old men
In the rich world, ageing skiers are gradual-
ly giving up the sport, although those who
keep going tend to have lots of time and
money to enjoy the snow. In America,
over-55s make up about a fifth of skiers; the
most avid are aged 72 and older. Still, their
numbers are not being made up fast
enough by younger skiers, for several rea-
sons. In many places ticket prices have ris-
en faster than inflation, although resorts of-
fer discounts for season passes and early
booking. In America, there is a trend for
richer people to ski more than they used to,
and poorer ones to ski less. Non-whites, a
growing slice of the population, are less
keen on skiing. In Europe, school trips to
the slopes are less common, even in coun-
tries such as Austria and Switzerland that
think of themselves as nations on skis.
With global travel, those with money can
just as easily fly to a beach in winter.
Mountains have only recently become
playgrounds. In Mediterranean antiquity
they were sacred places where the heaven-
ly touched the earthly: Greek gods dwelt
on Olympus and Moses was given the lawbeginning of the Industrial Revolution
have so far warmed the world by roughly
1 oC, on average. But the effect has been
greater in the Alps, the mountain range
most visited for winter sports, which has
warmed by about 2oC. This has been most
intense in summer, which is why the Mar-
molada glacier hasbeen melting so fast. In-
creasingly, though, global warming is af-
fecting the snow and ice in winters, too,
with profound consequences for the win-
ter-sports industry that has brought the
high life to poor Alpine valleys.
Daniel Scott of the University of Water-
loo, Robert Steiger of the University of
Innsbruck, and others, have looked at this
future warming in the context of the cities
chosen to host the Winter Olympics, from
Chamonix in 1924 to Pyeongchang in
South Korea next month and Beijing in- Even if emissions are cut to meet the
target of the Paris climate agreement of
2015, only 13 of the 21 look certain to be cold
enough to host snow-sports in the 2050s.
With high emissions, the number would
drop to just eightin the 2080s (see chart 1,
next page). The sight ofhelicopters rushing
snow to Olympic sites in Vancouver in
2010 may be a harbinger of the future.
A more immediate worry for the win-
ter-sports industry is that skiing and snow-
boarding have peaked in the rich world.
Laurent Vanat, author of an annual report
on snow and mountain tourism, estimates
Winter sportsSkiing goes downhill
PUNTA SERAUTA, ST MORITZ AND WANLONG
Global warming and ageing populations pose a double threat to winter sports. The
industry’s response is making it all worseInternational
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