The snow thieves: how high-carbon sponsors are melting winter sports

Global climate change is already affecting all sectors of society. This report looks at how carbon pollution is visibly ruining winter sports, tells the story of how the collapsing snow sports sector is being used as a billboard by some of the very major polluters whose emissions are speeding its downfall. The study examines the toxic relationship between high carbon emitters, such as the car, oil and airline industries as sponsors, and the winter sports sector, as promoters of their own climate destruction through advertisements and sponsorships that normalise high carbon products, activities and lifestyles.

The other main findings from the report are:

• Due to global heating linked to greenhouse gas emissions, compared to 1970, each year the snow cover in the northern hemisphere shrinks by an additional estimated 90,600 square kilometres, over one fifth the size of Sweden and over one third the size of Great Britain.
• Emissions from two sponsors of the ski world’s version of the London Marathon, Sweden’s famous Vasaloppet ski race, account for the loss of 210 square kilometres of snow cover per year, equivalent to 233 times the snow area used by the race
• Winter sports are increasingly vulnerable to rising global temperatures and other impacts of climate change, with many European ski resorts facing closures and disruptions this winter.
• International sporting events are coming under scrutiny over sponsorship deals with polluting companies, after a series of high-profile deals ended over climate change concerns.

Press release is available here.