Study: Ski Areas Losing Billions To Climate Change

Screen grab from live cam at Bear Mountain section of
Killington Resort, Vermont, taken March 4, 2024. Note
the unusual lack of snow in the woods in the background
A study indicates climate change is 
costing the ski industry billions of dollars. 

 To put it mildly, this has been a lackluster Vermont ski season, given the record warm winter, frequent thaws with rain thrown in every once in awhile. 

Vermont's experience this year is probably part of an expensive trend ski areas are dealing with. Here's the AP summing it up: 

"U.S. ski areas lost $5 billion from 2000 to 2019 as a result of human-caused climate change and could lose around $1 billion annually in the 2050s depending on how much emissions are reduced, a new study found."

The ski area losses are an example of how climate change is already starting to dent the economy, at least in some sectors.  

The Associated Press continues:  

"'It's a now problem, not a future-looking problem,' said Auden Schendler, senior vice-president of sustainability at Aspen One, a ski and hospitality company that helped fund the study, published in Current Issues in Tourism."

The study looked at 226 U.S, ski resorts and  used 1960-1979 as a baseline. Those years were before climate change had a noticeable effect on ski conditions. 

Then they looked at the seasons between 2000 and 2019, and found those season were shorter by 5.5 to 7.1 days compared to that earlier, golden era.

This despite the fact that snowmaking technology and capability was much better in the 2000s than it was in the 1960s and 1970s, 

Looking to the future, it gets worse:

"Under an optimistic emissions reduction scenario, the future of the U.S. ski industry would see seasons shortened by 14 to 33 days in the 2050s, even with snowmaking. A high-emissions scenario would nearly double the days lost."

Obviously, this trend will be uneven, with winners and losers every year. Vermont ski areas are salivating for just one damn snowflake for gawd's sake. Meanwhile, resorts in the Sierra Nevada have so much snow now they don't know what to do with it. 

Overall, though, the trend on skier days and skier visits will be drifting downward.  Making snow will only get you so far.