This year’s Beijing Winter Olympics marks the first time athletes have competed almost entirely on artificial snow, according to a report from Loughbough University in London. “The Beijing Games are making history as the first Winter Olympics to be held on almost 100% artificial snow,” the report says. Olympic organizers use dozens of snow generators and hundreds of snow blowers to create 1.2 million cubic meters of snow. But this matter of making history does not look very positive.
This will likely become the norm as the climate crisis continues, “starting with lower altitude slopes and increasing pressure and costs at higher [altitude] resorts,” the report said.
But the report’s authors note that producing artificial snow has a high environmental cost: “Even if powered by renewable sources, a large amount of energy is needed, which can be both costly and a significant loss to water resources.” It is also stated that athletes, artificial lands are less safe.
“Artificial snow is icy, so it’s faster and more dangerous. It also hurts more if you fall off the track, which is rocky and muddy hard ground rather than a fluffy snowdrift,” Estonian biathlete Johanna Taliharm told the Associated Press in January. .
Chris Grover, the cross-country skiing coach of the USA team, says that artificial land landing can “feel like falling on concrete”.
Artificial snow is naturally very different from real snow. Rather, it can be defined as a tightly packed slush made of water droplets that are shattered and frozen by machines.
Most ski and snowboard events at the Beijing Games, including freestyle, cross country, ski jumping and biathlon, take place in Zhangjiakou, about 110 miles northwest of Beijing. Bobsled, sledding and Alpine skiing events are held in Yanqing, a mountainous region about 45 miles from downtown Beijing, where the Olympic athletes’ village is located. Ice skating and several additional snow events are held at the Capital Indoor Stadium in central Beijing.
The 2026 Winter Games are scheduled to be held in Milan. Ideal conditions for creating artificial snow are described as a “wet bulb temperature” of about 20 degrees Fahrenheit, which represents the combination of actual temperature and air humidity. But temperatures rarely get this low in Milan.
The opening ceremonies of the 2022 Winter Olympics were held in Beijing on February 4; The games are scheduled to end on February 20.
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