Climate change is one of the biggest issues facing our planet. Its effects can be seen on our winters in the past twenty years with warmer temperatures, shrinking glaciers and reduced snowfalls. As skiers, our precious season seems to be getting shorter.
According to World Meteorological Organization figures, the global average temperature has increased by 1.1C since the start of the Industrial Revolution and nearly 20 percent of the increase has been in the past five years. According to an intergovernmental panel on climate change, this increase is likely due to human caused greenhouses gases since the mid-20th century.
Climate change is caused by the increase in greenhouse gas emissions into our atmosphere, the most abundant of which is carbon dioxide (CO2). Carbon dioxide is constantly being
released through the burning of fossil fuels.
Aircraft produce a disproportionate amount of carbon dioxide compared to land-based vehicles. So as heli-skiers, the uncomfortable truth is that we are contributing to the problem.
There are some heli-ski operations who are taking steps to mitigate their footprint though. Arctic Heliskiing has started to off-set their CO2 emissions by restoring wetlands around their lodges in Iceland. Their aim for the future is to not only mitigate their emissions and become carbon neutral, but to become climate positive through their reforestation efforts.
In September of 2020, Bella Coola Heli Sports became the first climate positive heli-skiing operation. The company measured their carbon output and decided to purchase carbon offsets from the Great Bear Forest Carbon Project. This project helps to preserve some of the British Columbia’s old growth forests that had been previously approved for commercial logging.
Bella Coola has partnered with Offsetters, an organization that advises on sustainability and carbon
management solutions. The company was established to meet the growing demand from companies for sophisticated advisory services related to their environmental impacts and a desire to reduce and
offset those impacts.
The co-owner of Bella Coola, Beat Steiner hopes that their lead will inspire other organizations in the adventure tourism industry to implement practices to create a more sustainable future.
About the writer
Chuck started out as a skier on the small island of Tasmania riding rope tows with nut crackers. A dream to ski in distant lands took him to Japan and Canada in pursuit of the powder dream. The best place he knew how to ski more powder was to work in the heli-skiing industry. After 4 years of working on the side of heli-ski operation management, he moved in to heli-ski guiding in Canada and New Zealand, where he worked for 9 seasons. He operates Hokkaido Powder Guides on the northern island of Hokkaido during the northern hemisphere winter. He is a qualified ski guide with the New Zealand Mountain Guide Association.
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