As Vermont’s drought lengthened and lakes and rivers shriveled this summer and fall, outdoor enthusiasts began to wonder: Would ski areas have enough water to make the snow so critical to their operations? The good news, most resorts report, is that the ponds they use for snowmaking are finally full again after some late-fall downpours. Many areas are on track to open for the long Thanksgiving weekend, a key date on the ski calendar.
In the era of climate change, water — too much as well as too little of it — has been added to the list of challenges facing the state’s ski industry. Many resorts have invested in year-round attractions such as mountain biking and golf as a way to hedge against the uncertainty of winter. They have to be prepared for extreme weather, including floods, in all seasons.
Sugarbush Resort in Warren experienced the impact of drought last year, when warm weather and low water levels in snowmaking ponds delayed its opening until December 4. Even then, just a handful of trails were skiable. A few days later, snowmaking was put on pause altogether, meaning no new terrain could open. Skiers weren’t thrilled.
It wasn’t until about mid-December that natural snowfall enabled the resort to open many of its trails.
“We ran out of water, and the pond wasn’t refilling,” said John Bleh, the resort’s communications manager. “Things are always a little bit more under the microscope in the early season, especially when you have limited terrain.”
Vermont remains in drought, even though recent rain — and, atop mountains, snow — has masked the underlying conditions. Rivers and streams have returned to near-normal levels, reducing the urgency some ski areas feel to prepare for a future with prolonged dry spells.
But Sugarbush is paying attention. The resort is discussing a new retention pond to expand capacity, according to Bleh. Its pond for Lincoln Peak, the resort’s main mountain, holds 18 million gallons, which is enough for about four to six days of snowmaking if it isn’t refilled, he said.
“I don’t think water storage is something that people really think about when they’re planning on skiing and choosing mountains,” he said. “But it’s become more relevant over the years as snowmaking has become that much more important.”
For the most part, ski areas rely on Vermont’s rivers and streams for the water they use to make snow. State rules, though, set minimum river levels that must be maintained as a way to protect stream ecosystems.
When the flow is high enough, resorts pump the water into retention ponds. Then, once temperatures drop below freezing, the water is piped up the mountain from the ponds, combined with compressed air and shot out of “guns” that turn it into snow. Groomers in snowcats then push it into place to ensure proper trail coverage.
Eighteen Vermont ski areas have state permits to withdraw water for snowmaking, according to the Agency of Natural Resources. On the low end, Sleepy Hollow Inn, a cross-country ski area in Huntington, uses an annual average of about 1.1 million gallons from two ponds fed by springs and ditches. Sugarbush withdraws an average of about 119 million gallons, primarily from the Mad River.
Killington Resort uses the most water, about 440 million gallons each year, much of which comes from the Ottauquechee River. The southern Vermont ski area is the largest in the state and boasts of having the longest season on the East Coast. With enough man-made snow, Killington is able to keep at least one trail open until late May or June.
In recent years, the resort has also faced pressure to open early in the season. Since 2016 Killington has hosted an FIS Women’s World Cup event on Thanksgiving weekend, bringing as many as 20,000 spectators to watch some of the best skiers on the planet. Creating the slalom run on the Superstar trail requires plenty of water to make enough hard-packed snow.
The event isn’t being held at Killington this year because a ski lift is being replaced. But snowmaking is already under way, and, as of Wednesday, November 12, the resort had officially opened for the season. Josh Reed, Killington’s communications manager, says water levels are not a concern.
Instead, Reed said, in recent years there has “been too much rain,” including Tropical Storm Irene in 2011, the July 2023 flooding and other summer deluges. This past May, Killington was pounded with a couple inches of rain during a slow-moving thunderstorm that forced the resort to close its golf course. Mountain biking was also delayed in the spring because of wet conditions.
In town and at the resort, Reed said, “all the money that’s being spent and all the planning that’s being done is to mitigate flooding. And I think that that’s probably going to continue, where we’re more concerned about too much water, not not enough.”
To manage these changing weather conditions, ski areas have turned to new technology. Bleh, at Sugarbush, said the resort’s new snowmaking guns can be used in smaller windows than the old technology, which allows the ski area to take advantage of shorter cold spells to make snow. The newer guns used by local resorts are more energy efficient, though some require more water. But operators note that the water is a reusable resource: Eventually, the snow melts and returns to the rivers and streams.
“The only thing we all can’t control is the temperature.”
Matt McCawley
Smugglers’ Notch, the Jeffersonville resort, has hired a company called Snowright to map the mountain terrain using remote sensing technology. That information is loaded onto software that snowcat operators use as they’re grooming. It allows them to see the snow depth and make informed decisions about where to move snow, reducing the amount of water and energy used, according to Matt McCawley, the resort’s communications manager.
“The snowmaking equipment technology, as well as the Snowright system, is certainly making it more efficient and extending conditions,” McCawley said.
Water for snowmaking has been less of a concern for Smugglers, he said, since the resort draws from the Lamoille River, a major waterway compared to smaller sources such as the Mad River.
“The only thing we all can’t control is the temperature,” McCawley said. “So no matter who has water — or if they don’t have water — if we don’t get temperatures that are consistently cold for a number of days, it doesn’t matter.”
Cross-country ski areas, which generally sit at lower elevations, are most at risk in the face of the warming climate. But they, too, are taking action to adapt and keep up the stoke. Three in Vermont — Sleepy Hollow, Craftsbury Outdoor Center and Rikert Nordic Center outside Middlebury — have state permits to make at least some snow to supplement the real stuff.
Craftsbury, which uses an annual average of 2 million gallons of water for snowmaking, now dedicates some of that water to a snow storage technique used in Europe that allows some trails to open early. Each winter, the outdoor center creates a massive pile of snow and covers it with a couple of feet of wood chips. The material insulates the snow from the heat of the summer, with minimal loss. By November, Craftsbury is able to open at least a small loop, enough for dedicated skiers and teams to get out there and practice.
“Snow farming is a Band-Aid under the context of something we call climate adaptation,” said Paul Bierman, a University of Vermont professor of environmental science who helped design Craftsbury’s snow storage system. “Which is, ‘Oh, all this shit is happening to us. OK — what are we going to do to try to maintain our lifestyle?’”
Even the snow pile has needed adaptations. The heavy rains during one summer deluge penetrated the wood chip layer and melted a large chunk of the saved snow that year, according to Yves Dubief, another UVM professor who helped design and study the project. The insulation was sturdy enough for normal conditions, he said, but the heap couldn’t withstand “tropical rain rates.”
“When you think you have a solution, then there’s always something else that comes along and says, ‘No, you don’t really have one,’” Dubief said.
Sleepy Hollow is taking the snow storage idea to another level, mocking up plans for an insulated building in which the ski area could make and store snow. As proposed, the 30,000-square-foot snow farm would be big enough for skiers to slide around inside “in the heat of the summer,” said Eli Enman, the center’s general manager.
He sees it as a hedge against drought, too. Since 2012, Sleepy Hollow has made snow and can now cover about 3.4 kilometers of trail. But both snowmaking ponds were quite low this fall, including one that is fed only by ditches. The snow farm would allow him to have some white stuff to roll out in early winter even if Mother Nature weren’t cooperating.
“It’s really hard to have a ski area without snowmaking now,” he said. “And it’s only going to get worse.”
In the best-case scenario, Enman said, snow farm construction could begin next summer. For now, he’s just hoping for a cold and snowy winter.
So is Sugarbush. The resort’s ponds are full, according to Bleh, and snowmaking has begun. They’re aiming to open on November 22 — the week before Thanksgiving.
The original print version of this article was headlined “Snow Business | Drought and deluges are the latest climate-change challenges for Vermont ski areas”
This article appears in The Winter Preview Issue 2025.
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