In one of Switzerland’s most popular Alpine destinations, resort staff have been working over the summer months to limit the impact of warming global temperatures on its glacial slopes – by blanketing the ice to block the sun.
The 3,238-metre (10,623-ft) Mount Titlis, Switzerland, has seen large swathes of ice disappear from its glacier over recent decades. Within the next half century, all of it is expected to melt.
A handful of employees work over five-to-six weeks to cover parts of the glacier with a protective polyester fleecing, which helps stave off summer melting and preserve more of the snow that fell in the previous winter.
A handful of employees work over five-to-six weeks to cover parts of the glacier with a protective polyester fleecing, which helps stave off summer melting and preserve more of the snow that fell in the previous winter.
They now cover some 100,000 square metres, or roughly the size of fourteen football fields, with the reflective fleece, which helps radiate the sun’s energy back into the atmosphere, before spending weeks peeling it back off again.
Declining snow cover as a result of climate change poses an existential threat to ski resorts throughout Europe.
According to Swiss government, 90% of its remaining 1,500 glaciers will be gone by the end of the century if nothing is done to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
Reference- Reuters, World Economic Form, EcoWatch, Hindustan Times, National Geographic