The impact of man-made snow

As our local resorts are now taking advantage of very cold weather to make snow, it’s a good time to ponder the ecological impact of snow-making on our environment. Since snow guns work best at night, folks living near the slopes must put up with relentless noise that also negatively affects wildlife! 

Then, there’s the question of water availability, particularly in winter, when mountain streams are low, making it often necessary to transport the water or have it stored on site through man-made ponds. While adjuvants (ice nucleation-active proteins from bacteria) are no longer added in Europe they still are in America. These serve as nuclei to induce the formation of ice crystals at relatively high temperatures. 

Once produced, artificial snow is 50 times harder and 4 times denser than its natural version; it also tends to waterproof the soil it covers and contributes to gullying and erosion. Slower to disappear, it tends to extend the seasonality of melting. Snow guns generally require between 3,000 and 4,000 cubic meters of water per hectare of slope covered, which suggests a thickness of one foot or 30 cm. 

Accordingly, it takes approximately 106 gallons (400 litres) of water to produce one cubic meter of snow, a significant amount of this water is lost due to evaporation, and thus is not returned to the water table. Furthermore, since it takes approximately 3.5 to 4.3 kWh of energy to produce one cubic meter of snow it would represent around 17,500 kWh of electricity. Power costs vary wildly and are half in the US of they are in Europe. 

In France, producing one cubic meter of snow costs $2,5 which includes water, power, investment amortization and labor costs but not grooming expenses. As a country, France also uses around fifteen million cubic meters of water per season to make snow, and this activity cost the largest ski areas in America and Europe around 1 to 2 million dollars per season depending on their infrastructure, not counting labor, infrastructure cost and grooming expenses. 

Obviously, the high cost of man-made snow is passed on to the end-user under the form of more expensive lift tickets. Without making snow, US ski resorts would lose over $1 billion annually and skiing would quickly lose its attraction, especially in view of an accelerating climate change!