The past four decades have seen extensive development of the winter sport industry in the French Alps and several hundred ropeway transport systems have been installed in areas where mountain permafrost may be present. Due to current climatic change and the ensuing permafrost degradation, the vulnerability of these infrastructures to destabilization may increase. Therefore, there is a real potential for instabilities to develop on ropeway transport systems in the Alps, requiring a better understanding of these processes. This study investigates the relation between permafrost and infrastructure stability in the French Alps, seeking to understand the evolution of this phenomenon over the past decades. This was done by following a two-step analysis. At first, the infrastructure elements built on modeled permafrost-affected areas were inventoried at the scale of the French Alps in order to get an overview of the possible vulnerabilities. Then, our study presents a detailed historical inventory of damage to infrastructure over the past three decades in different geomorphologic contexts. Overall, in the French Alps, there are almost 1000 infrastructure elements located in permafrost areas among which 12 (i.e., 24 infrastructure elements) were identified to have been subject to repeated instances of disruption and deterioration and most of the damages recorded were in areas where permafrost degradation is fully expected (ice-rich terrain). Infrastructure recovery costs may be significantly high, making this issue a relevant consideration to be included in the design process.

Climate change in the circumpolar region is causing dramatic environmental change that is increasing the vulnerability of infrastructure. We quantified the economic impacts of climate change on Alaska public infrastructure under relatively high and low climate forcing scenarios [representative concentration pathway 8.5 (RCP8.5) and RCP4.5] using an infrastructure model modified to account for unique climate impacts at northern latitudes, including near-surface permafrost thaw. Additionally, we evaluated how proactive adaptation influenced economic impacts on select infrastructure types and developed first-order estimates of potential land losses associated with coastal erosion and lengthening of the coastal ice-free season for 12 communities. Cumulative estimated expenses from climate-related damage to infrastructure without adaptation measures (hereafter damages) from 2015 to 2099 totaled $5.5 billion (2015 dollars, 3% discount) for RCP8.5 and $4.2 billion for RCP4.5, suggesting that reducing greenhouse gas emissions could lessen damages by $1.3 billion this century. The distribution of damages varied across the state, with the largest damages projected for the interior and southcentral Alaska. The largest source of damages was road flooding caused by increased precipitation followed by damages to buildings associated with near-surface permafrost thaw. Smaller damages were observed for airports, railroads, and pipelines. Proactive adaptation reduced total projected cumulative expenditures to $2.9 billion for RCP8.5 and $2.3 billion for RCP4.5. For road flooding, adaptation provided an annual savings of 80-100% across four study eras. For nearly all infrastructure types and time periods evaluated, damages and adaptation costs were larger for RCP8.5 than RCP4.5. Estimated coastal erosion losses were also larger for RCP8.5.