Ski slopes smaller and lifts slower?
Winter sports areas ahead of uncertain season due to snow-making facilities
Created: 12/04/2022, 10:50 am
By: Miriam Haberhauer
An uncertain winter awaits Bavaria's ski areas: energy crisis, pandemic, inflation.
Added to this is the fear of a possible ban on snow cannons.
Munich – Many businesses that depend on ski tourism have had to fight to survive in recent years.
The corona pandemic is leaving deep economic scars and energy prices have also risen sharply since the outbreak of the Ukraine war.
Due to the energy crisis, some operators now also fear a snow-making ban.
Snow-making ban due to energy crisis?
- High energy costs for ski resorts
The snowmaking technology consumes a lot of energy, as Egid Stadler, the managing director of the mountain railways in Sudelfeld,
explained to the
BR .
Overall, the system only runs about 100 hours a year, but it is a real power guzzler: "Overall, we have an average of around 650,000 to 700,000 kilowatt hours that we need for snowmaking," says Stadler.
On the other hand, the operation of the lift systems, which run daily in winter, consumes as much energy throughout the entire ski season as 100 hours of snowmaking.
In order to save energy costs, the operator only wants to use the snowmaking technology this year when it is really cold.
The machines should work more efficiently and produce more snow with the same power consumption.
However, you cannot do without snowmaking entirely.
"Without snowmaking, a modern ski area is practically impossible to operate these days," Stadler told
BR
.
Instead, the operator will probably let his mountain railway run more slowly than before, and the seat heating could also remain switched off this year.
Ski pass prices are also likely to rise more than usual this year - especially in Austria, skiers have to dig even deeper into their pockets.
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Snowmaking ban for the first time?
- Aiwanger gives the all-clear
However, Bavaria's Economics Minister Hubert Aiwanger (Free Voters) gives the all-clear.
At the Tourism Day in Munich, the politician spoke out clearly against a ban on snowmaking and made it clear: “We have to pull the plug on such ideologically motivated ideas early enough and have to say very clearly: No, people must also be allowed to relax outside ."
The Greens, on the other hand, have had a thorn in their side for a long time - the party in Garmisch-Partenkirchen had already checked in September whether the use of snow cannons is justifiable in view of the energy crisis.
(mha)
