If any of the scottish ski resorts wanna extend their season then the answer has got to be a large amount of piste that is covered by snow cannons, 7 Springs ski centre in the USA has only had a dusting of snow so far this year but already is thinking about opening for ski-ing using snow making, they have an extensive cover and once the temperature reaches 0 they can cover most of the resort. I think at least one centre in Scotland has got to consider a system like this instead of the bits and pieces there are at the moment.

There are many issues with regards snow making in Scotland, many which have been aired before on Winterhighland. Firstly there is simply the cost, not just of installation, but the opperating costs, if the Lecht blasted out their cannons at every possible moment, even when there was currently plenty snow, it would no doubt improve the reliability of cover, but would they have to increase ticket prices to pay for it?

One important thing to consider is that humidity is as important as temperature in whether snowmaking is possible. It might be -4 at CairnGorm and only -2 at the Lecht at the same time, and snowmaking is underway at the Lecht, but if CairnGorm had cannon's they'd be idle. The Eastern side of the mountains have drier air, and the drier the air, the higher the min temp for snow making. I have heard estimates that with the same technology, CairnGorm would only be able to make snow on about 50%-60% of the occasions that the Lecht can.

The situation is obviously more of a problem in the West at Glencoe and Nevis, which did try cannons, but gave up.

Undoubtly CairnGorm would benifit from even a small number of strategically placed cannons, and there is some capacity in the water system put in
for the funicular for future trials on the lower Cas / Zig Zags. Probably the area that would benifit greatest is the Top Basin, where the Ciste up-track and fairway could be topped up to help them last as long as, or longer than the gully side, it would also be an area that would not need much snow to be made if we had a snowless mountain, in a cold dry period. Another good option for such scenarios would be the M1 Poma and M1 Side Track, a well defined area that could be easliy covered, and help keep a vital access lift open.

Possible planning issues, with the National Park coming into effect during the 2003 season will make have implications on any snowmaking attempts on the 'Gorm, and certainly the cost of installation will be high to ensure minimal impact during installation, and the necessary reinstatment work.

With the exception of the Lecht the other big issue for the areas, is WATER!!! Why are you laughing!! Both in terms of storage issues, and in the fact that high up we only have small mountain streams which can not provide huge volumes of water for massive snow making operations. Taking all the water out of the water courses would not be acceptable ecological management by the ski areas. Thus huge snowmaking would require pipes and pumping stations to take the water from lower elevations, back up onto the mountain, this would make the system much more expensive.

There certainly is scope to go somewhere with snowmaking, but a lot of thought needs to be put into it. I think it would be better to go with a well thought out, possibly costly good system, than just to go in with a half baked adhoc scheme thrown together at minimum cost.

The one hope is the success of CairnGorm's funicular as a year round attaraction may unlock potential backing to fund further developments.

Of course longer term (well maybe not so long) we can always hope global warming brings the gulf stream screeching to a halt!! :-)

I reckon snow cannons would be a great idea. Especially if you look at the moment, the FL has been around 1000-1500ft for a week or so now. If they had Cannons at 'Gorm they could have been pumping out lots of snow and we as a result could have a significantly better (and longer) season. Hope also that the GS will be brought to a halt, but problem with that would be that it would about 10 degree celcius colder than it is at the moment and as the Ben and Cairngorms is only about 1.5 degree celcius or so off being glaciated as it is at the moment, Scotland would start to look like this again...

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Not that this is in my opinion a bad thing!

I have just been reading in the one of the Sunday Papers, that other European Resorts have built resevoirs at the bottom of their resort to collect the water for the Snow Cannons. Couldnt Scottish Ski Areas use a similar supply for their water? All that would be needed then would be a pumping station to get it back up the hill. Cairngorm, for example, has Loch Morlich at the foot of the mountain. I know its in a conservation area, but surely the ammount of water they take out will not exceed the total going back in from natural resources. Besides, once the season is over and the snow melts, it will all end up back down there anyway!!!

Glenshee has a small man-made Lochan by the Cairnwell Cafe which is used for this purpose, and the Lecht have a large semi-underground tank by their piste basher shed, but there is no chance of CairnGorm ever getting to build anything like that. They had to have huge storage tanks for a fire supression system in the funicular tunnel, and they had to be incoperated within the Ptarmigan Restaurant.

There is certainly potential for taking water back up the mountain, but compared to a small system using a limited amount of water from the mountain the cost would be high. Personally I dont know if extensive snowmaking would be yet be viable on CairnGorm, but certainly concentrated snowmaking on afew vital areas such as the M1 Poma and M1 Side Track that could provide uplift and a route to the middle without much snow, the Ciste Tow Track, and the bottom of the Cas Track and Zig Zags would be good areas, possibly also the Carpark Track, which would help with uplift in the mornings and provide a skiable route down late in the day. However that may be uneccessary, there are plans for putting in a new Carpark Chairlift, as the old one was sorely missed last winter.

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