Vulnerability of ski tourism towards internal climate variability and climate change in the Swiss Alps - PubMed (original) (raw)
. 2021 Aug 25:784:147054.
doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.147054. Epub 2021 Apr 20.
Affiliations
- PMID: 33894612
- DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.147054
Free article
Vulnerability of ski tourism towards internal climate variability and climate change in the Swiss Alps
Fabian Willibald et al. Sci Total Environ. 2021.
Free article
Abstract
Increasing temperatures and snow scarcity pose a serious threat to ski tourism. While the impacts of climate change on ski tourism have been elaborated extensively, little is known so far on the vulnerability of winter tourism towards both internal climate variability and climate change. We use a 50-member single model large ensemble from a regional climate model to drive the physically-based snowpack model SNOWPACK for eight stations across the Swiss Alps to model daily snow depth, incorporating both natural snow conditions and including technical snow production. We make a probabilistic assessment of the vulnerability of ski tourism towards internal climate variability in a future climate by analyzing selected tourism-related snow indicators and find significant overall decrease in snow reliability in the future. Further, we show how the sensitivity towards internal climate variability differs among different tourism-related snow indicators and find that certain indicators are more vulnerable to internal climate variability than others. We show that technical snow production is an appropriate adaptation strategy to tackle risks from climate change and internal climate variability. While technical snow production can drastically reduce uncertainties related to internal climate variability, in low elevations, the technique reaches its limits to counteract global warming by the mid of the century.
Keywords: Climate change; Internal climate variability; Large-ensemble; Ski tourism; Snow indices; Snow modelling.
Copyright © 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Conflict of interest statement
Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
Similar articles
- Climate controls on snow reliability in French Alps ski resorts.
Spandre P, François H, Verfaillie D, Lafaysse M, Déqué M, Eckert N, George E, Morin S. Spandre P, et al. Sci Rep. 2019 May 29;9(1):8043. doi: 10.1038/s41598-019-44068-8. Sci Rep. 2019. PMID: 31142772 Free PMC article. - Overloaded! Critical revision and a new conceptual approach for snow indicators in ski tourism.
Abegg B, Morin S, Demiroglu OC, François H, Rothleitner M, Strasser U. Abegg B, et al. Int J Biometeorol. 2021 May;65(5):691-701. doi: 10.1007/s00484-020-01867-3. Epub 2020 Feb 4. Int J Biometeorol. 2021. PMID: 32020306 Free PMC article. Review. - Pan-European meteorological and snow indicators of climate change impact on ski tourism.
Morin S, Samacoïts R, François H, Carmagnola CM, Abegg B, Demiroglu OC, Pons M, Soubeyroux JM, Lafaysse M, Franklin S, Griffiths G, Kite D, Hoppler AA, George E, Buontempo C, Almond S, Dubois G, Cauchy A. Morin S, et al. Clim Serv. 2021 Apr;22:100215. doi: 10.1016/j.cliser.2021.100215. Clim Serv. 2021. PMID: 34239989 Free PMC article. - The Ski Climate Index (SCI): fuzzification and a regional climate modeling application for Turkey.
Demiroglu OC, Turp MT, Kurnaz ML, Abegg B. Demiroglu OC, et al. Int J Biometeorol. 2021 May;65(5):763-777. doi: 10.1007/s00484-020-01991-0. Epub 2020 Aug 26. Int J Biometeorol. 2021. PMID: 32845376 Free PMC article. - A ticket to where? Dwindling snow cover impacts the winter tourism sector as a consequence of climate change.
Leal Filho W, Dinis MAP, Nagy GJ, Fracassi U, Aina YA. Leal Filho W, et al. J Environ Manage. 2024 Apr;356:120554. doi: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2024.120554. Epub 2024 Mar 14. J Environ Manage. 2024. PMID: 38490001 Review.
Cited by
- Snowmaking in a warmer climate: an in-depth analysis of future water demands for the ski resort Andermatt-Sedrun-Disentis (Switzerland) in the twenty-first century.
Vorkauf M, Steiger R, Abegg B, Hiltbrunner E. Vorkauf M, et al. Int J Biometeorol. 2024 Mar;68(3):565-579. doi: 10.1007/s00484-022-02394-z. Epub 2022 Dec 6. Int J Biometeorol. 2024. PMID: 36471177 Free PMC article. - Importance of temporary and permanent snow for new second homes.
Falk MT, Hagsten E, Lin X. Falk MT, et al. Int J Biometeorol. 2024 Mar;68(3):581-593. doi: 10.1007/s00484-022-02420-0. Epub 2023 Jan 6. Int J Biometeorol. 2024. PMID: 36607447 Free PMC article.
LinkOut - more resources
Full Text Sources
Other Literature Sources