AI paints frightening picture of climate change at golf’s most famous venues

Climate change could pose a greater threat to golf’s most iconic views than anyone first thought.

OLBG has used AI imagery from Midjourney and Adobe Firefly to reimagine what the Old Course at St Andrews and Augusta National in Georgia could become if grave concerns about rising sea levels materialise.

The image below is an AI adaptation of Augusta National in the future, a generalisation of the golf course as opposed to a specific hole if issues with flooding in this area of Georgia continue.

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Research from the Pulitzer Centre in 2021 reported that parts of the Georgia coast have lost salt and tidal marshes. Rising water is eroding the salt marshes and killing wetland areas, with scientists outlining problems with the planet becoming warmer.

A doomsday outlook perhaps on the host golf course of the Masters, the first major of the golf season held in April, but this AI prediction would make the hallowed Augusta turf inoperable for players and spectators.

OLBG grabbed another AI image based at the home of golf in Scotland, as you can see below. Again, this is a generalisation of the course as opposed to a specific hole but recent studies suggest sea levels in the Auld Grey Toon could rise by 90 cm by 2100 with a change of 14 mm per year.

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The Centre of Expertise for Waters also claims a round at the Old Course at the end of the century mightn’t even be possible. Alarm bells have long been ringing around St Andrews in relation to coastal erosion and climate change.

Climate Central claimed in a study earlier this year that parts of St Andrews could be submerged in less than 30 years. A report from the Scottish Government’s Dynamic Coast also said that erosion and flood risks are “growing threats” to the St Andrews Links.

In April, the BBC reported that Montrose Golf Club had lost seven metres of land to the sea in the space of 12 months and that 34 courses on Scotland’s coast were vulnerable to similar damage.

The above images represent the first time that the horrors of climate change and rising water levels have been depicted, albeit artificially.

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