As the world struggles to make progress to limit climate change, researchers are finding ways to adapt to warmer winter temperatures — by developing environmentally friendly ways of producing artificial snow.
Chances are if you know anything about Norway, you know it’s a place where skiing was born.
Norse mythology describes gods and goddesses hunting on skis, and 4000–year-old petroglyphs from northern Norway include some of the earliest known drawings of people on skis. One of the most recognizable Norwegian paintings worldwide depicts two skiers in 1206 fleeing to safety with the country’s two-year-old prince, Håkon Håkonsson.
As the world struggles to make progress to limit climate change, researchers are finding ways to adapt to warmer winter temperatures — by developing environmentally friendly ways of producing artificial snow.
Chances are if you know anything about Norway, you know it’s a place where skiing was born.
Norse mythology describes gods and goddesses hunting on skis, and 4000–year-old petroglyphs from northern Norway include some of the earliest known drawings of people on skis. One of the most recognizable Norwegian paintings worldwide depicts two skiers in 1206 fleeing to safety with the country’s two-year-old prince, Håkon Håkonsson.
Over the centuries, skiing in Norway has evolved from a practical mode of winter transport to a sport that is deeply ingrained in Norwegian culture. Norwegians themselves like to say they enter the world uniquely prepared for their northern home — because they are “born with skis on their feet”.
But warmer weather due to climate change has made for less-than-stellar ski conditions in Norway and across Europe. Advances in snowmaking, where water is “seeded” with a protein from a bacterium that allows snow to be made at temperatures right around freezing, simply aren’t enough to keep up with the changing climate.
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Image credit: Erik W. Kolstad via Wikimedia Commons
