Climb the highest peak of all Seven continents.
Leave no Trace behind.
Tales of consequences
The Seven Summits ascent is an achievment for many adventurers.
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The publicity around the expeditions on these summits attract each year more people seeking to surpass themselves. But high altitude mountaineering can sometimes take a toll on the mountain environment, especially on the highest peaks.
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Demands on your body at such altitudes are quite high. So high, that sometimes your waste and equipment become a liability that can interfere on your descent. Sadly, the Western consumer mindset see the trash as an inevitable byproduct that is simply left behind (ropes, oxygoen bottles, organic waste, gaz canisters).
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More accessible summits like Kilimanjaro and Elbrus raise other set of issues. As they are easier to climb, they attract even more mountain enthousiats, unfortunately leading to a more trash and oragnic wastes.
Being an optimistic, I am convinced another way is possible. A different approach, a different planning, embeding comprehensive waste management at its core.
Reaching the summit is optional, bringing everything back down with you is mandatory.
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And that is what this project is all about.
Africa
Europe
Asia
Africa
How did we let this happen?
A quick look into the evolution of mountaineering shows how mass adventure led to layers of waste over the last century.
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History can be told in three periods :
Mountain Explorers :
Expeditions are state sponsored. there is prestige to have your flag flown over the highest peaks of the world.
@ReinholdMessner
Mountain Consumers :
Advances in the quality of expedition equipment, and the dissemination of mountaineering highlights through social networks are democratizing these climbs (with all the consequences that this may have…)
Mountain Racers :
Some individuals, and extreme mountaineers, push the limits of mind and body by breaking speed records and number of summits conquered (Reinhold Messner, Ueli Steck, Ed Viesturs, etc.)
@Nimsdai
Apart from the accumulation of a large number of mountaineers on each of these peaks (which can make access to the summit difficult on certain occasions), one of the main consequences of this massive commercialization of the highest peaks is the creation high altitude dumps.
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A subject increasingly discussed in the press :
What gets left behind at the top of the world?
“According to the Himalayan Database, every year around 800 climbers attempt to summit the tallest peak in the world—Mount Everest. The number has gone up from 20 in 1964 to about 36,000 in 2012 and up to 140,000 kg of solid waste is estimated to remain after 60 years of expeditions.”
Conflict, Garbage, Controversy: Lessons From K2
“Though we paid the proper fee to have our garbage taken out from Base Camp, we are not sure it wasn’t just thrown in a crevasse, as seems to be standard practice,” wrote Ian Welsted, who attempted the Southwest Ridge last year.
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“The key is not just cleaning. Mainly, it’s not littering. Up in the thin air, only the climbers themselves decide if they are going to do something about garbage. The future of the very industry is at stake.”
Ongoing efforts...
Initiatives have been launched by a few individuals to clean up these mountains.
This is the case of the famous Nimsdai (14x8000) through its "Big Mountain Cleanup" project.
Or even the French Marion Chaygneaud-Dupuy, mountain guide, who participated between 2016 and 2019 in the "Clean Everest" project, in partnership with Tibetan guides.
The waste accumulation is all the more problematic as global warming and melting ice accelerate the pollution of waters used by local communities.
I think that the solution is not only in cleaning the existing wastes on those summits, but also in the awareness of the mountaineering community that it is necessary to adapt behavioral standards during these ascents.
The goal of this project is therefore to show that with good planning, and slight additional individual constraints, the ascent of one of these peaks can be done without leaving any human traces on the mountain.
Whoami
I was 6 years old when I first saw some alpinists launch themselves on the ridge of Aiguille du Midi with the Mont Blanc summit in sight. This image stayed in my mind during all my life, and climbing Mont Blanc soon became a dream.
A dream that I fulfilled in july 2021 alongside my father.
Since then, a passion for mountaineering has emerged in me, whereas it is through literature, with the tales of some famous mountaineers like Reinhold Messner, Ueli Steck, Ed Viesturs, the infamous Nirmal Purja or through the movies and documentaries of Jimmy Chin, Alex Honnold, Marc Andre Leclerc, Conrad Anker and many others.
Quickly, I knew that I wanted to follow the steps of those adventurers of the extreme, and the 7 summits were the gradual goals that will lead me towards this world.
After a year of alpinism training with Guides06 in the national park of Mercantour (South Alps), learning the skills required to climb the steepest ice slopes (with guides like Stephane Benoist, Fabien Artero, Guillaume Cadas, Nicolas Ferraud) and some mix-climbing training in Chamonix with Damien Bideau (my guide from the Mont Blanc ascent), I am now technically and physically ready to tackle the first steps of this life project.
However, the waste management issue on those summits, that materialized during my research, started to wear me down. It felt like a problem that went directly against the core values that I acquired during the past 5 years, working as a portfolio manager at Sanso Investment Solutions, an asset management company specialized in Sustainable and Responsible Investments.
That is when I decided to shift this life long project towards a more ecological tale, hoping to set a precedent of responsiveness regarding the mountains, and do so in partnership with my firm, and, hopefully, with everybody who will be willing to share this message.
