The Vulnerability of the Snow Industry in the Swiss Alps

Elsässer, H.; Messerli, Paul

doi:10.1659/0276-4741(2001)021[0335:tvotsi]2.0.co;2

Cited by 148 publications

(104 citation statements)

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“…This is demonstrated in the ski industry with its expanding investment in snow-making capacity (Elsasser & Messerli, 2001) and could be manifested more often in future by seaside resort hotels adjusting to rising sea levels (or reasonable threat of same) by building floodwalls or opening new facilities on higher ground. Tellingly, investments in such adaptation strategies contribute directly to sustainable tourism only insofar as the latter includes the financial sustainability of operators.…”

Section: Issue 5: a House Dividing? Adaptation Versus Mitigationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Can sustainable tourism survive climate change?

Weaver

2011

Journal of Sustainable Tourism

216

121

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This opinion piece contends that tourism's expanding engagement with climate change, as it is currently unfolding, is not necessarily conducive to the interests of tourism sustainability. Inherent unpredictability, long-term timeframes, lack of directly tangible consequences or clearly identifiable villains, issues with credibility and vested interests and cost implications in an era of chronic economic uncertainty all combine to increase the likelihood of unsuccessful climate change policies and strategies. Additional complications arise within the tourism sector from the rudimentary state of knowledge about the relationships between the tourism and climate change, an apathetic and fickle travelling public and a reciprocally uncommitted tourism industry. I argue that adaptation is a rational business response to climate change that is not directly related to environmental and sociocultural sustainability, and that mitigation measures should be supported to the extent that they yield practical and tangible short-and medium-term benefits and address local sustainability issues such as air quality and biodiversity protection.

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Section: Issue 5: a House Dividing? Adaptation Versus Mitigationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Can sustainable tourism survive climate change?

Weaver

2011

Journal of Sustainable Tourism

216

121

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“…Snow is a resource of utmost commercial (tourism, hydro-power) and social value (drinking water supply, hazards such as avalanches) for the Alpine region (Abegg et al, 2007;Elsasser and Messerli, 2001). Snow climate indicators have been featured as one of the hallmarks in monitoring climate change in the IPCC reports (Lemke et al, 2007) but also its relatively bad observational record has been stressed.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Snow variability in the Swiss Alps 1864–2009

Scherrer

Wüthrich

Croci-Maspoli

et al. 2013

Intl Journal of Climatology

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ABSTRACT:We present a climate analysis of nine unique Swiss Alpine new snow series that have been newly digitized. The stations cover different altitudes (450-1860 m asl) and all time series cover more than 100 years (one from 1864 to 2009). In addition, data from 71 stations for the last 50-80 years for new snow and snow depth are analysed to get a more complete picture of the Swiss Alpine snow variability. Important snow climate indicators such as new snow sums (NSS), maximum new snow (MAXNS) and days with snowfall (DWSF) are calculated and variability and trends analysed. Series of days with snow pack (DWSP) ≥ 1 cm are reconstructed with useful quality for six stations using the daily new snow, local temperature and precipitation data. Our results reveal large decadal variability with phases of low and high values for NSS, DWSF and DWSP. For most stations NSS, DWSF and DWSP show the lowest values recorded and unprecedented negative trends in the late 1980s and 1990s. For MAXNS, however, no clear trends and smaller decadal variability are found but very large MAXNS values (>60 cm) are missing since the year 2000. The fraction of NSS and DWSP in different seasons (autumn, winter and spring) has changed only slightly over the ∼150 year record. Some decreases most likely attributable to temperature changes in the last 50 years are found for spring, especially for NSS at low stations. Both the NSS and DWSP snow indicators show a trend reversal in most recent years (since 2000), especially at low and medium altitudes. This is consistent with the recent 'plateauing' (i.e. slight relative decrease) of mean winter temperature in Switzerland and illustrates how important decadal variability is in understanding the trends in key snow indicators.

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“…[2] Snow is a resource of great commercial and social value for the Swiss Alpine region (tourism, drinking water reservoir, hydro-electricity) but it also bears considerable hazards (avalanches, road closures) [e.g., Beniston et al, 2003;Elsasser and Messerli, 2001]. However, the number of snow days (SD) varies substantially on interannual to decadal time scales.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trends in Swiss Alpine snow days: The role of local‐ and large‐scale climate variability

Scherrer

Appenzeller

Laternser³

2004

Geophysical Research Letters

205

188

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[1] Swiss Alpine snow cover is varying substantially on interannual to decadal time scales. In the late 20th century decreases in snow days (SD) have been observed for stations below 1300 m asl. A regression model is used in this work to quantify the importance of mean temperature and precipitation as well as large-scale climate variability in order to explain the observed trends. Both, local-and largescale models account for a modest fraction of the observed seasonal variability. Results suggest that the recent decrease in low altitude snow cover can mainly be attributed to an increase in temperature. Differences are found for northern and southern Switzerland concerning the influence of large-scale climate patterns. In contrast to southern Alpine regions, northern Alpine interannual SD variability is almost unaffected by the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO). Decadal trends, however, can be explained via temperature only by a model that includes the explanatory variable NAO.

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The Vulnerability of the Snow Industry in the Swiss Alps

Abstract: BioOne Complete (complete.BioOne.org) is a full-text database of 200 subscribed and open-access titles in the biological, ecological, and environmental sciences published by nonprofit societies, associations, museums, institutions, and presses.

Cited by 148 publications

References 0 publications

Can sustainable tourism survive climate change?

Can sustainable tourism survive climate change?

Snow variability in the Swiss Alps 1864–2009

Trends in Swiss Alpine snow days: The role of local‐ and large‐scale climate variability

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