2030 Winter Olympics

XXVI Olympic Winter Games

Winter Summer 2030 Winter Paralympics

The 2030 Winter Olympics, officially known as the XXVI Olympic Winter Games, is an upcoming international multi-sport event. It will be organised in a city designated by the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

Bidding process

The new IOC bidding process was approved at the 134th IOC Session on 24 June 2019 in Lausanne, Switzerland. The key proposals, driven by the relevant recommendations from Olympic Agenda 2020, are:

• Establish a permanent, ongoing dialogue to explore and create interest among cities/regions/countries and National Olympic Committees for any Olympic event
• Create two Future Host Commissions (Summer and Winter Games) to oversee interest in future Olympic events and report to the IOC executive board
• Give the IOC Session more influence by having non-executive board members form part of the Future Host Commissions.

The IOC also modified the Olympic Charter to increase its flexibility by removing the date of election from 7 years before the games, and changing the host from a single city/region/country to multiple cities, regions, or countries.

Future Host Winter Commissions

The full composition of the Winter Commissions, overseeing interested hosts or with potential hosts where the IOC may want to focus on, is as follows:

Future Host Winter Commissions for 2030 Winter Olympics

IOC members (4)	Other members (4)
Octavian Morariu (chair) Gunilla Lindberg Karl Stoss Samira Asghari	Zhang Hong (Athletes) Ivo Ferriani (AIOWF) Neven Ilic (NOCs) Rita van Driel (IPC member)

Dialogue stages

According to the Future Host Commission's rules of conduct, the new IOC bidding system is divided into 2 dialogue stages:

• Continuous dialogue: Non-committal discussions between the IOC and interested parties (City/Region/Country/NOC interested in hosting) with regard to hosting future Olympic events.
• Targeted dialogue: Targeted discussions with one or more interested parties (called preferred host(s)), as instructed by the IOC Executive Board. This follows a recommendation by the Future Host Commission as a result of continuous dialogue.

Bidding parties

The three first potential submitting bidding parties were revealed by Octavian Morariu, the chair of the Future Host Winter Commission, during the 135th IOC Session at the SwissTech Convention Centre in Lausanne, Switzerland. He mentioned Sapporo of Japan. Salt Lake City of the United States; a joint bid from the Spanish cities of Barcelona and Zaragoza, and the Pyrenees region have conducted feasibility studies. Vancouver, Canada made a preliminary bid submission in February 2021.

Stakeholders

Stakeholders are those cities or regions that have expressed potential interests in hosting the Games. To date, six National Olympic Committees, representing a total of four bids, have expressed their interests. They are:

• Barcelona-Andorra–Pyrenees, Spain, Andorra and France; Barcelona previously hosted the 1992 Summer Olympics and earlier that year Albertville, the proposed venue for nordic and sliding events, hosted the 1992 Winter Olympics. Andorra, as the home of the Grandvalira resorts, could co-host snowboarding and Freestyle skiing events. The proposal would have Barcelona host ice sports and the Olympic opening and closing ceremonies at the Estadi Olímpic Lluís Companys along with eight sports in other Spanish cities, France host five sports in Courchevel (nordic combined and ski jumping) with luge, skeleton, bobsleigh in La Plagne and Andorra host one in Soldeu (Alpine skiing).
• Sapporo, Japan; site of the 1972 Winter Olympics, and also the marathon and racewalking events at the 2020 Summer Olympics. Sapporo hosted the FIS Nordic World Ski Championships 2007.
• Vancouver-Whistler, British Columbia, Canada; Vancouver and Whistler hosted together the 2010 Winter Olympics. Vancouver hosted the 1960 and 2001 ISU World Figure Skating Championships, the 2009 ISU World Single Distances Speed Skating Championships, the 2019 IBSF Bobsleigh and Skeleton World Championships, the 1966 and 1987 World Men's Curling Championships and the 2013 FIL World Luge Championships. Whistler hosted the FIS Freestyle World Ski Championships 2001 and the FIS Snowboarding World Championships 2005. British Columbia hosted several other major competitions in all summer and winter Olympic sports.
• Salt Lake City, Utah, United States; site of the 2002 Winter Olympics. In February 2020, following the announcement of Sapporo's bid, the organizing committee for the Salt Lake City bid was considered moving their intention to bid for the 2034 Games as the Summer Games are scheduled for Los Angeles in 2028. At the first meeting in June 2021, the organizing committee considered whether it should change the bid for 2030 or 2034. The decision for Salt Lake City on the bidding for 2030 or 2034 Winter Olympics could be made after Beijing 2022 ending. President and chief executive of the Salt Lake City Bid Committee Fraser Bullock mentioned that the small window between the Los Angeles 2028 and a potential Salt Lake City 2030 Games could be a real difficulty to manage and that the feasibility study for this is still ongoing.

Developments

Vancouver and Sapporo are the current front runners; however, Sapporo has been criticized for its major lack of infrastructures and the reluctance of public opinion towards a costly new candidacy of Japan after the cost and the troubles held during the organizing the 2020 Summer Olympics and 2020 Summer Paralympics in Tokyo, and its lack of organization regarding winter sports events at the international level, and even hosting the event in 1972, the city has since managed to host few winter sporting events: the most notable being: Three editions of Winter Asian Games, the first in 1986, and the same event in four years later in 1990 and in 2017 and the 1991 Winter Universiade. The city's infrastructure is too outdated by current standards. Sapporo officials put the projected costs at $2.55 billion–$2.65 billion with about $700 million coming from taxpayer money, which may be politically dangerous given Tokyo's cost overruns. Current mayor of Sapporo Katsuhiro Akimoto, acknowledged concerns about the costs "People have expressed hopes, too, but they are especially worried about the heavy cost burden in the future." 

Contrary to what happens with Sapporo, Vancouver's candidacy fits exactly within what is proposed in the Agenda 2020 of the IOC (reuse of existing infrastructures, strong, pro-environment organization, slim budget and city suitable for winter sports and major sporting events). Vancouver currently leads the odds for getting the games, ahead of Sapporo and Barcelona-Pyrenees. "If successful, the bid will be genuinely ground breaking in a range of areas. Vancouver set the standard for a forward-thinking and socially responsible Winter Olympics in 2010, and in 2030 the city and wider region will take this template even further. The bid in 2030 benefits from existing world-class venues and stadia, and from a city that knows the value of a focus on sustainability, inclusivity, and environmentally conscious infrastructure. As the greenest ever Games, Vancouver 2030 will be a low cost, light touch template for the future of the Olympics".

Bill Mallon, the cofounder and former president of the International Society of Olympic Historians, said "Vancouver bid will benefit from having existing ultra modern and ecological infrastructures, having hosted the Games so recently, which will reduce costs, and that the IOC would very well likely look favourably upon an Indigenous-led bid". "A more modest price tag might appeal to the IOC which has tried in recent times to shift toward a smaller financial and ecological footprint" with "a clear, defined legacy aligned with the city’s long-term development plans for each venues".

Hosting another edition of the Games at the city would require minimal new infrastructure, experts claim; athlete accommodation and a curling venue are the only major missing pieces: "For any host cities, the sliding centre, ski jumps and speed-skating ovals prove the most challenging infrastructure to find. However, Vancouver has them all and they are being maintained to international standards. Similar to Olympic Village, there could be a new build with non-market housing option, a true legacy of a lot of new housing with the potential for social housing. This is also where we could see a win for many communities, including First Nations."

An online poll published in 2021 by Research Company showed that less than 60% of respondents were in favour of hosting the Games in Vancouver. This survey, however, was criticized for its margin of error , lack of sampling , sample size (< 800) and the fact that it was conducted entirely online without monitoring . The support evaluated for a low-cost bid with private participation of the Games in Vancouver since 2019 is evaluated between 75 and 86%, with a margin of error between 1.2 and 2.8%. Meanwhile, the joint project from Pyrenees-Barcelona in Spain has been struggling with regional infighting and will likely face a contentious referendum in 2022.

On December 10, 2021, the City of Vancouver and the Resort Municipality of Whistler joined the Four Host First Nations from Vancouver 2010 to formally announce their joint candidacy after the signing of a memorandum of understanding.

The effort to bring the 2030 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games to Vancouver is the first-ever Indigenous-led bid in the history of the Olympic movement.

Later, an internal source from IOC has mentioned that the 2030 and 2034 winter games could be awarded simultaneously at the next IOC session. 

Bid details

Bid Party	Country	National Olympic Committee	Logo	Bid Committee Website	Status
Vancouver	Canada	Canadian Olympic Committee (COC)		vancouver2030.org	Stakeholders
Main article: Vancouver bid for the 2030 Winter Olympics
Sapporo	Japan	Japanese Olympic Committee (JOC)		sapporo2030.jp	Stakeholders
Main article: Sapporo bid for the 2030 Winter Olympics
Barcelona–Pyrenees	Spain Andorra France	Spanish Olympic Committee (COE) Andorran Olympic Committee (COA) French National Olympic and Sports Committee (CNOSF)			Stakeholders

Potential bids

• Almaty, Kazakhstan
• Savoy, France
• Borjomi, Georgia
• Leipzig, Germany
• Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina

Broadcasting rights

• Brazil – Grupo Globo
• Canada – CBC/Radio-Canada
• China – CMG
• Japan – Japan Consortium
• Korea – JTBC
• United States – NBCUniversal

In the United States, these Games will once again be broadcast by NBCUniversal properties, as part of its US$7.75 billion contract to air the Olympics through 2032.