全球變暖對冬奧會有何影響？

Laurie L. Dove 笪景行

The precursor1 to the Winter Olympic Games was held in 1901， just five years after the first Summer Olympic Games in 1896. Known then as the Nordic Games and held initially2 in Sweden， this cold weather competition became so popular that it began moving from country to country and grew into one of the most-watched events in the world. The 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi， Russia， drew hundreds of millions of viewers， including more than half of the entire population of the United States. Soon， however， the Winter Olympics may struggle to find a city cold enough to host the games.

A team of researchers led by Daniel Scott， a geography professor at the University of Waterloo in Ontario， has collected climate data from previous Winter Games and applied current climate change models to the historical information. By predicting future winter weather conditions， Scott and other researchers posit3 that by 2050， nine of the prior4 Winter Games locations will not be cold enough to ever host the competition again.

Although the research was originally published in 2014， it was recently updated to include the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang， South Korea， and the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing， China. Scotts team used rising global greenhouse gas emissions5 projections6 to estimate7 an increase of 2.2 degrees Celsius by 2050. Using this model， Chamonix， France， the site of the first official Olympic Winter Games in 1924， would have an increase of 3 degrees Celsius by 2050， making its snowfall and temperature too unpredictable to make sure it could host the Winter Games.

A warming climate may affect not only future Winter Olympics， but athletes abilities to train. In the United States， for example， warm weather is predicted to cut the length of ski and snowboard seasons by half. This is expected to occur by 2050. By 2090， the current length of ski and snowboard seasons will be reduced by 80 percent.

冬季奧運會的前身是在1901年舉辦的，就在1896年第一屆夏季奧運會的五年之后，當時被稱為北歐運動會，最初是在瑞典舉行的。而這個寒冷天氣里的比賽變得非常受歡迎，開始從一個國家傳到另一個國家，并發展成為世界上最受關注的賽事之一。2014年俄羅斯索契冬奧會吸引了數億觀眾，其中包括美國一半以上的人口。然而，很快，冬奧會可能很難找到一個足夠寒冷的城市來舉辦了。

加拿大安大略省滑鐵盧大學的地理學教授丹尼爾·斯科特領導的一個研究小組收集了以往冬奧會的氣候數據，并將當前的氣候變化模型應用在歷史信息上。通過預測未來的冬季天氣狀況，斯科特和其他研究人員推測，到了2050年，之前的九個冬奧會舉辦地將不夠寒冷，無法再次舉辦比賽。

雖然這項研究最初發表于2014年，但最近更新了研究內容，包括2018年韓國平昌冬奧會和2022年中國北京冬奧會。斯科特的小組利用不斷上升的全球溫室氣體排放量預測，估計到2050年氣溫將增加2.2攝氏度。在該模型下，1924年第一屆正式冬奧會舉辦地法國夏蒙尼，到2050年氣溫將增加3攝氏度，使其降雪量和溫度難以預測，無法保證能夠主辦冬奧會。

氣候變暖不僅會影響未來的冬奧會，還會影響運動員的訓練能力。以美國為例，據預測，溫暖的天氣將使滑雪和滑雪板季的長度縮短一半，這種情況預計會在2050年之前出現。到了2090年，現有的滑雪和滑雪板季的長度將縮短80%。