Atomic-backed summit puts the ski industry’s climate challenge on the agenda

The fourth Ski Industry Climate Summit will bring brands, resorts, suppliers and advocates to Bolzano in January 2027. Atomic is not just a participant: it is the event’s driving force, helping convene an industry whose commercial future depends on winter conditions.

The winter sports business is built on a contradiction: companies sell equipment and experiences that rely on snow, while the production, transport and use of their products contribute to environmental pressures. The Ski Industry Climate Summit aims to make that tension a shared industry problem—and to move discussion toward practical responses.

Its fourth edition is scheduled for January 12–14, 2027, at Fiera Bolzano, alongside the Prowinter trade fair. Atomic powers the summit in collaboration with Protect Our Winters Europe and the Winter Sports Sustainability Network, with operational support from Prowinter. Organizers describe it as a forum spanning the winter-sports value chain, including brands, suppliers, retailers, resorts, associations, researchers and policymakers.

Atomic’s role is central. The ski manufacturer initiated the summit in 2023 with Protect Our Winters Europe, bringing industry stakeholders together to discuss issues including materials, circularity, emissions measurement and collaboration. The event has since broadened beyond its original brand-focused conversations. Organizers say the 2027 program will combine high-level sessions with technical working groups addressing supply-chain decarbonization, life-cycle assessment, material innovation, circularity and advocacy.

That convening role matters because many of the industry’s challenges cross company boundaries. Brands may compete for customers, but they share suppliers, materials, manufacturing constraints, regulation and the climate risks facing ski destinations. Standards for measuring product impacts, for example, are harder to compare if companies use different methods. Repair and recycling systems also depend on coordination among manufacturers, retailers, service providers and consumers. The summit’s stated aim is to create space for shared learning and work on common approaches.

The urgency is not abstract. A peer-reviewed study assessing 2,234 European ski resorts found that, without snowmaking, 53% would face very high snow-supply risk under 2°C of global warming, rising to 98% under 4°C. Snowmaking reduced the projected shares in the study, but brings additional water and electricity demands. Separate Alpine research using satellite observations found declining snow reliability across nearly all ski areas studied, with the strongest losses late in the season.

For resorts, those pressures translate into operational and financial decisions; for equipment makers such as Atomic, they raise questions about how to reduce the impacts of products and supply chains while adapting to changing winter conditions. The company’s involvement gives the summit industry access and influence, but also makes accountability important: convening discussions is a start, not evidence on its own that emissions or material impacts are falling.

The previous summit, held in Bolzano in January 2026, brought together brands, suppliers, resorts, federations, NGOs and experts. Reporting from the event described discussions moving from broad climate goals toward implementation, including circular business models, product life extension and shared approaches to life-cycle data. Those priorities are expected to remain relevant as the 2027 summit turns to regulation, market change, climate science and decarbonization strategies.

The organizers report that the 2026 summit had 174 participants and 49 presentations, keynotes and workshops. For the 2027 edition, the test will be whether a larger, more diverse forum can turn that kind of exchange into commitments that companies and other stakeholders can measure—and sustain beyond the conference.

Atomic’s leadership gives the summit a direct link to one of the sector’s major brands, while the participation of advocacy groups, resorts and technical experts can widen the debate beyond product marketing. The real measure of success will be what follows: shared methods, practical collaboration and demonstrable progress in a business whose future is tied to the future of winter.