On the other hand, to advocate “adaptation” is, in my opinion, to surrender in a fight with astronomically high stakes.

The big advantage to going the “adaptation” route is that it doesn’t require a shift away from the fossil fuel based model that has served many of us so well for so long.

However, I would rather try and shift to alternative energy sources and practices in order to try and save what still can be saved of the natural world than admit defeat.

Such a shift would have many other benefits (e.g. countries like the US are well positioned to provide the technology of the future, I’d rather live near solar than coal, electric cars are quiet and clean, etc.), but this change is obviously not favored by some extremely powerful and entrenched interests.

And if any one is interested, I would suggest reading up on the claim that “Met Office… scientists are now telling us that there has been no statistical global warming in the last 16 year.”

Here is Rutgers University Snow Lab’s 45 year trend in North American snow extent:

Fall – Up
Winter – Up
Spring – Down

http://climate.rutgers.edu/snowcover/chart_seasonal.php?ui_set=namgnld&ui_season=1

…reminded me of an argument I came across recently on a CBC Ideas podcast, which related to the notion of “adaptability” with respect to climate CHANGE. In contrast to GW, there is considerable evidence that solar activity could lead to global cooling. So, the point was, that the key to surviving global climate change is building energy and infrastructure systems that can accommodate change, in either direction! Notwithstanding the evidence for climate cooling, there is enough uncertainty about local effects of climate change that we can not, as a society, meaningfully predict and prepare ourselves for specific climate changes (precip, temperature, wind, etc).

The answer? I think it needs to be adaptive, de-centralized systems with low capital investment costs, that can respond to climate variability. In the ski world, I think this means developing “light-footprint” local hills, with minimal (and portable??) infrastructure (think yurts instead of hotels). Short of that, I’ll just go backcountry skiing! $100 for an over-used hill with receding snow-loss problems, or $0, a map, and a sense of adventure for an experience that can’t be taken away? Easy.

You mentioned that you would have preferred a little more information. Not sure if you saw the video in my first post but it will address your concerns far better than my load of acronyms.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYvXV2KxfQs

Also – just for the fun of it, I’ve linked a video by Henrik Svensmark, a physicist that is looking at climate change from an entirely unique perspective. I’m posting here because you will likely not see this in mainstream media as apparently it’s not politically correct (yet…) This is a great short film – very well done, hopefully you will have a chance to see it. If Svensmark is right our concept of climate will change radically. His theory is currently being tested at CERN in Switzerland (CLOUD experiment).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANMTPF1blpQ

Hope you have a great ski season.

Lou – apologies if you think this is off topic, but if these guys are correct we might not have to be concerned about saving our ski resorts due to global warming.

No Lou,

We can’t “shift this discussion to how we can keep the resorts alive.”