The future of the Winter Olympics is under threat because of climate change, according to a new report from Britain’s Loughborough University.
The warning comes as Beijing prepares for the opening of the 2022 Games this week, the first time a city has hosted both the summer and winter events. It also will be the first Winter Olympics to use almost 100% artificial snow, with more than 100 snow generators and 300 snow-cannons working to cover the slopes.
Zhangjiakou, which lies 200 kilometers northwest of Beijing, will host freestyle skiing and snowboarding, cross-country skiing and ski jumping. Despite the bitter cold, with temperatures reached minus 17 degrees Celsius this week, it rarely snows.
Olympic site manager Jacques Fournier is in charge of the snow machines. “Here has no humidity, and it's very dry, and there's a lot of wind. So, in that kind of condition, the goal and the target is really to make the snow compact, and to prepare rapidly to not let it [be blown away] by the wind.”
Winter resorts have increasingly turned to artificial snow to make up for a lack of natural snowfall. However, a new report from Britain’s Loughborough University warns that athletes’ safety could be at risk.
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