As winter warms, Olympic organisers hunt for snow

Future games will need to be held at higher altitudes, with multiple venues, suggests new research

- ERIC NIILER

AS AN ELITE cross-country skier who grew up in Alaska, Gus Schumacher is used to training and racing in biting cold and driving snowstorms.

But in recent years, Schumacher, who is preparing to compete in several events at the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics next month in Italy, has been skiing through wet, mushy snow surrounded by barren hillsides. “It’s entirely man-made snow and kind of brown on the sides,” Schumacher said about some of his recent competitions. “It’s not the nicest way to ski.”

After a warm and dry early winter in the Italian Alps, local officials now say this year’s outdoor venues have enough machine-made snow to last for the 19 days of competition. But Olympic organisers say holding a winter sports extravaganza every four years is becoming less certain, and will require more flexibility to pull off, thanks to a warming planet.

“By the middle of the century, we will probably have around 10 to 12 countries to have a cold enough climate to host Olympic snow sports,” said Karl Stoss, chairman of the International Olympic Committee’s Future Host Commission, which decides which cities get the games.

By 2050, of the 93 cities deemed suitable to handle the logistics of holding both the Olympics and Paralympics, just four would be able to host the events without snow-making, according to a study published Wednesday. Those cities are Niseko, Japan; Terskol, Russia; and Val d’Isere and Courchevel in France.

“Climate change is altering the geography of where the Winter Olympics and Paralympics can be held,” said Daniel Scott, an author of the study in the journal