Climate change, IOC’s sustainable initiatives severely limiting the field of hosts for 2040 and beyond.
Julie Jag, Salt Lake Tribune, Oct. 13, 2023
The assessment that International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach gave Friday regarding the number of places around the world that could be viable options for a Winter Games rotation was dismal. But it appears Salt Lake City may be among the few remaining potential hosts. At a press conference following a meeting of the IOC executive board in Mumbai, India, Bach announced that a mere 10 sites would have enough snow to host a Winter Olympics at mostly existing venues beyond 2040. That revelation, he said, has given the committee a sense of urgency when it comes to finding a solution to keeping the Winter Games going in the face of climate change. “From these numbers,” he said, “it becomes even clearer that we need to address very quickly these dramatic impacts of climate change on winter sport in the Winter Games.” One of the ideas that has gained the most traction is a rotational system that would limit the Games to a handful of sites that would host once every 20-30 years. That field of candidates just shrank, however, as the result of two studies conducted by the IOC. One looked for sites that could host the Olympics using 80% existing venues, of which it found 15 spread across three continents. The second looked for sites that would have enough snow to host the Winter Games by the middle of this century. Of those 15, two wouldn’t have enough snow to host the Winter Olympics by 2040. A total of five wouldn’t have enough to host the Paralympics, which typically take place after the Olympic Games in March. More …