Posted on 17 December
2009 - Plans for new skiing
areas in the region around the Carpathian
Mountains and the Balkans threaten to harm
major protected areas that house some of
Europe’s last remaining untouched wilderness.
New developments and
expansion plans for existing facilities
for downhill skiing are in the works across
many parts of the region, particularly in
Romania, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Ukraine.
In theory, potential
conflicts between nature conservation and
development – including for ski tourism
– should be mediated by procedures such
as Environmental Impact Assessments and
the European Union’s Article 6 of the Habitats
Directive, which provide a system for evaluating
potential impacts on nature and identifying
solutions and measures to mitigate negative
impacts.
In practice, however,
these safeguards are of limited effect,
and in the face of intense pressure from
economic and political forces, nature conservation
is often given short shrift.
The Carpathian Mountains
are Europe’s last great wilderness area
– a bastion for large carnivores, with some
two-thirds of the continent’s populations
of brown bears, wolves and lynx. They are
also home to the greatest remaining reserves
of old growth forests outside of Russia.
Meanwhile, the Balkan
Mountains and the Rila-Rodope Mountain Range
in Bulgaria contain outstanding natural
features that are of global importance,
including the Rila and Pirin National Parks,
which have been recognised, respectively,
as a certified PAN Parks wilderness area
and a UNESCO World Heritage Park.
“It is striking how
little climate change and sustainability
appear to be entering calculations for many
of the new ski area,” said Andreas Beckman,
Director of WWF Danube-Carpathian Programme.
“Already, rising temperatures and decreased
precipitation and snow cover is causing
problems for many facilities, with some
poor recent ski seasons.”
A glance at the Alps
should raise questions about the wisdom
of pouring investments into ski areas in
the Carpathians. According to the Organisation
for Economic Cooperation and Development,
as many as two-thirds of Alpine ski areas
could go out of business according to current
projections for climate change, while Alpine
areas lower than 1,500 m are facing a very
uncertain future. In fact, a 2004 report
concludes that alpine ski regions in Slovakia
at 1,150-1,500 meters above sea level may
be uneconomic by 2030.
Ski resorts being developed
across the Carpathians and Bulgarian mountain
ranges are already including adaptation
measures to climate change in the form of
snow cannons. But ironically, through their
huge consumption of energy snow cannons
only contribute to accelerating the rise
in temperatures. The estimated 3,100 snow
cannons in Europe consume per year and hectare
roughly 1 million litres of water and 260,000
kWh of electricity – i.e. roughly as much
energy per year as a city of 150,000 inhabitants
and as much water as a city the size of
Hamburg.
Construction of ski
facilities of course can have very significant
impact on habitats and species, not only
due to removal of forest cover and other
vegetation to make way for ski runs, access
roads and infrastructure, but also due to
fragmentation of habitats and wildlife avoidance.
Secondary effects such as the abstraction
of water for artificial snow production
and deterioration of environmental conditions
due to heavy tourist flow concentration
can also have heavy impacts for biodiversity
and nature values.
“EU support must not
be given for any problematic developments,
including those that clearly contravene
EU and national legislation as well as projects
that are likely to be unviable over the
medium-term, e.g. as the result of climate
change,” Beckmann said. “In addition relevant
authorities must be pressured to fully apply
EU legislation in their countries, including
especially Strategic and Environmental Impacts
Assessments as well as the EU’s Habitats
and Birds Directives, for projects at the
planning stage.”
“Ski developments must
not be permitted in protected areas, especially
in national parks and core areas of any
other protected area, in High Conservation
Value Forests and High Nature Value Farmlands,”
said Erika Stanciu, WWF Danube-Carpathian
Programme, Forest and Protected Areas Team
Leader. Careful consideration should be
given to valuable natural and traditional
landscapes. Developments in Natura 2000
sites must respect provisions of EU’s Article
6 of the Habitats Directive.”
“In the meantime we
can all avoid ski areas that do not comply
with basic criteria for environmental safeguards
and legislation”, she adds.
For example, Bansko,
in the heart of Pirin National Park in Bulgaria,
is a popular ski destination that has become
infamous for being the first of a series
of illegal ski developments in Bulgarian
protected areas. The project received approval
from authorities in 2000 and was built in
subsequent years. Half of the ski runs in
Bansko have no environmental permits, while
those ski runs which do have permits have
violated each requirement of the Environmental
Impact Assessment decision. These violations
include for example the width of ski runs
- instead of the permitted 30 m they actually
are 60 to 100 m wide. The European Commission
has initiated penalty procedures against
Bulgaria because of violations of environmental
law in the case of Bansko.
The development has
caused significant environmental problems,
including landslides in Pirin National Park,
but has also had social and economic implications.
Bansko was once a popular summer resort,
but visitor numbers have dropped in recent
years due to higher prices and over-development
of the once picturesque town. And as if
this is not enough, earlier this year the
Consultative Council of Pirin National Park
submitted to the Ministry of the Environment
a proposal to alter the park management
plan in order to permit the construction
of two huge new ski zones inside the park.
The epidemic nature
of the problem is also in Slovakia where
authorities have essentially opened the
Tatras National Park to development – a
marked change as the area has been relatively
strictly protected for the past thirty years.
As a result, the country’s
flagship protected area is facing intense
pressure. Five ski areas are being developed
around the park, including development of
ski runs and expansion of tourist facilities,
with little if any state control or proper
assessments. As a result, the area could
lose its international recognition as a
national park by IUCN, the world conservation
union. The European Commission has also
begun investigating impacts of the developments
on Natura 2000 protected areas.
Despite international
recommendations and pressure, Slovak authorities
have yet to adopt clear zoning and management
plans for communities in the area. Zoning
and planning could guide development and
management of the area, ensuring opportunities
for development while maintaining the natural
values that are the area’s chief attraction.
The lack of any planning or guidelines,
together with the hands-off attitude of
relevant authorities, has essentially given
developers free rein to develop the area.
In Ukraine, one of the
20 largest ski areas in the world has been
stamped out of the ground in the Ukrainian
Carpathians, not far from the city of Ivano-Frankivsk.
Development of the Bukovel area is continuing,
with total investment in the area reportedly
planned eventually to reach €3 billion.
A total of 66 lifts,
400 km of ski runs, and 100,000 beds, an
airport and 15 million annual visitors are
planned overall. The development counts
on significant artificial snow production,
including 500 snow production sites, 300
snow lances, 40 mobile propeller snow cannon
and a 100,000 m3 artificial lake to provide
water for snow production. The Ukrainian
government weighed in behind the project
as a site to host the 2018 Winter Olympic
Games, although in the end it did not make
the bid.
Unfortunately, many
of the existing and planned ski developments
in Romania are also in areas of high natural
value, including within existing protected
areas and often in areas included in the
Natura 2000 network of specially protected
sites. Many of these areas are of outstanding
natural value, not only of national, but
also EU and even global importance.
Some 40 percent of the
45 areas with proposed ski facilities that
have been identified in a Romanian country
study are inside or next to proposed Natura
2000 sites and 17.8 percent will be located
in the strictly protected areas from nature
and national parks.The most striking examples
are the planned ski resorts Pestera Padina,
in the Bucegi Nature Park and Padis – 12
km of ski pistes in the strictly protected
area of Apuseni Nature Park. The parks are
not only flagship parks for Romania and
indeed Europe, but also contain key Natura
2000 areas.
These projects enjoy
very considerable public sector support,
both in terms of legislation and approvals
as well as direct support for investment.
Development of ski tourism is given priority
in many planning documents for regional
and local development. Many of the projects
in EU countries, e.g. Slovakia and Romania,
expect to receive very significant support
from the EU, especially through co-financing
from regional development funds.
The €772 million in
EU Structural Funds that Slovakia will receive
in the period 2007-13 for supporting “Competitiveness
and Economic Growth” will include substantial
investment in constructing, modernizing
and extending ski centres. But for many
of the projects, the long-term profitability
and public interest is questionable.
