Expect Almost No Snow Below 1,200 Meters In Alps By 2100; End Of Skiing Least Of Their Worries

In the golden age of skiing during the 1960s and 1970s, snow was dependable at Lackenhof, which sits at 800 meters (2,624 feet) on the eastern edge of the Austrian Alps. But since the 2000s, it's unpredictable. Winter is retreating up the mountains. Global warming has already shut down scores of European ski hills outside the high alpine zones. Lackenhof could be next.

"Last year, we had about 20 days, the year before, even fewer," mechanic Karl Oberreiter says, working on the control panel of a chairlift. "I don't think we've had a full season since the 1980s. There's a point where you can't do it anymore. After that, I don't know." Oberreiter's concerns echo across the across the heart of the Alps in Austria and Switzerland like a mournful yodel.

Winters are 10 to 30 days shorter than during the 1960s. By 2100, there will be almost no snow below 1,200 meters — an average elevation for ski towns. The overall snow cover in the Alps will decline 70 percent, according to recent climate studies. Preserving winter tourism and sports in the Alps beyond 2100 requires not just keeping global warming below 2 degrees Celsius, but the Paris Agreement's more ambitious — and many say, extremely unlikely — goal of 1.5 degrees.

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In Mayrhofen, Austria, at just 633 meters in the Tirolean Alps of Austria, winter snow cover has dwindled to nearly nothing over the past 30 years, and that pattern is widespread across Austria, Marc Olefs, a climate researcher with the with the Austrian Central Institute for Meteorology and Geodynamics (ZAMG) tells DW. Austrian winters have shortened by 10 to 20 days since the 1950s, and maximum snow depth has declined at all elevations and nearly all regions of the mountainous country, with small localized exceptions, Olefs says.

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http://www.dw.com/en/ski-resorts-cling-on-against-climate-change/a-41972961