As Earth’s temperature steadily rises, the human faces many crises because of it. One might be the melting of snow, which would result in the making of man-made snow.

The 2022 Winter Olympics takes place in Beijing, China which is currently experiencing a drought. This drought means there is no snow for the Olympic games.

Using Italy’s TechnoAlpin, Beijing created snow for the games, but it comes at a cost. To make snow would require drastic amounts of energy and water.

With an area of 800,000 square meters to cover of competition grounds, that would require 49 million gallons of water. We are in a time where we are rapidly running out of freshwater so making the snow does not help.

Man-made snow is not only bad for the environment, but it is dangerous for the athletes. It can become very slick and icy which makes it difficult to do anything on it.

“If freestyle super pipes are formed from snow-making machines in a poor season, the walls of the pipe are solid, vertical ice and the pipe floor is solid ice,” Laura Donaldson, a freestyle skier from Scotland, told researchers for the Slippery Slopes report. “This is dangerous for athletes, some have died.”

Without this snow there cannot be anymore Winter Olympics. However, just because we can, does it mean we should?