Ask anyone in the know what the biggest trend is these days in snowmaking, and the answer is either automation or energy efficiency, sometimes a dovetailing of the two. Increasingly, ski areas are going the automation route. Automation allows them to reduce, or make better use of, manpower and affiliated labor costs, while also making better use of air and water resources. And increasingly, equipment manufacturers are producing guns and other hardware that reduce energy requirements, in some cases dramatically.

Automation can be intimidating in at least a couple of ways. In the classic industrial-revolution paradigm, some area operators worry that automation inevitably means machinery displacing human labor. As Bill Van Zee, operations manager of DemacLenko says, after suggesting automation to one potential customer, the response he got was: “If I’m going to put in automation, I’m going to lose my job.”


ALTA: CREEPING AUTOMATION
While automation has enabled some areas to reduce labor costs, machinery has not displaced humanity entirely. It has, however, helped areas use manpower more effectively. The big advantage of automation, says Van Zee, is a more efficient use of “equipment and man-hours to produce more snow by operating only at the optimum windows of opportunity.” Alta is a case in point. When weather conditions aren’t viable, Alta’s system automatically shuts down; when conditions are right, the system can start and reach maximum production quickly.

Upfront retooling costs are another concern. Alta softened the blow by phasing the move over more than 15 years. It began working with Lenko Snow AB in 1995 and in 1996 hired Steve Harris to engineer the system. The result is a very productive and efficient system that makes best use of limited resources.

A mid-mountain lake supplies water under gravity pressure to the two pump houses. This allows very efficient pumping, and guns throughout the base areas run with no pumping at all. The lake can be refilled from water sources at one of the pump houses, and the system can make snow at many locations and elevations simultaneously—and automatically.

Sno.matic I-snow software controls the pumps and valves, so that “pump houses can work together or independent of each other, and the water sources can be directed as needed,” says Van Zee. A second computer controls the guns, using Lenko’s SnoNet software and radio modems that run from DemacLenko’s automated hydraulic hydrants.


BOLER MOUNTAIN: TWO BOLD STEPS
Another area to go the full automation route, using Johnson Controls Snow technology, is Boler Mountain, a small area near Toronto. Boler entered the automated world in two phases, first in 2008 on its main mountain and then this year with its West Hill expansion.

One of the big advantages, according to Marty Tholy, a member of Boler’s management team, was “capturing those short windows” of snowmaking opportunity, especially in the early season. Tholy says the system allows Boler snowmaking to be operating “at 100-percent efficiency within four minutes” when weather conditions cue the computer to get guns blazing. And the system can shut down automatically just as quickly when temperatures rise to impractical levels.

The first installation at Boler involved Borax stick guns, while the second phase featured 35 low-e Rubis Evo guns, each with its own weather station, according to Celeste Jacroux, Johnson’s Snowmax product manager. And while Jacroux concedes that ski areas are “looking at a hefty price tag up front” in installing an automated system, “they’re now seeing how they are saving money on the back end.”

Numbers from the first installation phase at Boler bear her out and justify the expansion of automation in the West Hill project this year. Among the noteworthy stats were a 71 percent reduction in snowmaking hours and a 56 percent reduction in energy costs compared with the pre-automation system.

In addition, says Tholy, automation has improved Boler’s early-season reliability (and its early-season revenue stream), and helped enable a more efficient use of manpower. Not only can Boler operate the system with a two-man team, but, as Tholy puts it, “machines can be much more efficient, especially in the 4 a.m. to 7 a.m. time frame when people get tired.” (Perhaps snowmakers, rather than fearing the loss of their jobs, will be happy about the prospect of shorter hours during the graveyard shift.)


BOREAL: STEPPING INTO AUTOMATION
An increase in early-season revenue and a more efficient use of resources and manpower were also critical components in Boreal’s decision to automate its SMI-based system. The initial upgrade was begun in 2008-09, after what Shaydar Edelman, Boreal’s director of operations and services, calls “a four-year slump” in early-season skiing.

Edelman’s objective was to forge a system that could start up by Halloween. In its initial installation, Boreal upgraded 13 tower guns and 12 carriage guns to guns with on-board electric air compressors. Other guns were brought up to speed in 2010. The entire system is run by SMI’s SmartSnow 6.0. “Almost every gun operates with its own weather station. It’s always set up to turn off (automatically) when the temperatures warm up,” Edelman says.

SMI’s Nic Horgan describes the Boreal fleet as a combination of Super Polecats, Pumas, and Viking sticks with five-horsepower on-board compressors that he calls “the luxury liners of stick guns.” The change to the new technology and automation, says Horgan, has allowed Boreal to “capture a whole new market by having the best offering (in the Tahoe area) in October and November.”

Indeed, says Edelman, an increase in early-season revenues has allowed Boreal to pay off the initial upgrade in less than three years, where a 10-year payoff would have been expected without the additional revenues. In addition, Boreal was able to decrease its diesel usage by 125,000 gallons by switching to the electric, on-board compressors, and saw a total decrease in operating expenses of 55 percent. “We have been very, very pleased,” he says.


BLUE KNOB: UPDATING THE OLD
Not all areas seeking higher efficiency opt to reinvent their snowmaking systems entirely. In fact, says Doug Houch, general manager at Pennsylvania’s Blue Knob, “Old technology saved us this year.” How so? Working with Snotech/ Larchmont, Blue Knob re-nozzled 25 guns, mounted on 24-foot masts, at the minimal cost of $60 per nozzle. In doing so, the area was able to reduce compressed-air output from 550 cfm to 320 cfm per gun with, says Houch, “no difference in snow production.”

While gaining efficiency, Blue Knob was still able to put tried-and-true technology to work; as Houch puts it, “in high winds (common at Blue Knob) and cold temperatures, nothing works better than old air-water guns.” The ski area plans to continue retrofitting older guns in its artillery, says Houch.

While Snotech/Larchmont’s model line keeps expanding, with the efficient Lex-C gun being introduced this year, the ability to manufacture laser-cut nozzles, made of heat-treated aluminum, to fit older guns is clearly a company strength. According to Snotech/Larchmont co-owner Tom Tropeano, not only are the nozzles 30 percent more efficient, their durability far surpasses the typical five-year life span of older brass nozzles.


CATAMOUNT: EFFICIENT RETROFIT
Another area that chose to retrofit rather than replace was Catamount in western Massachusetts, working with TopGun. Three years ago, Catamount replaced nucleators on its 400 fan guns and was able to reduce its compressed-air consumption from 90 cfm per gun to 15 cfm, according to Bob Stickle, Catamount’s mountain ops manager. This past winter, the ski area made the additional upgrade of installing cold-weather valves that would not require heating to remain ice-free and functional.

TopGun approached the Catamount job as essentially a custom fitting. “Catamount needed a problem solved, and we made a prototype and then made (the replacement parts) in our shop,” says Troy Jervas, TopGun’s president.

In addition to improving efficiency, Catamount was able to speed up its snowmaking operations. “They’re now able to get up to maximum efficiency very quickly, and time is money,” says Jervas. Stickle confirms that the new valves have enabled Catamount “to reduce snowmaking hours by 150 hours from last year and reduce labor and utility costs, all without jeopardizing our quality or quantity.”


ISRAEL: EYE ON THE FUTURE
Upgrading existing technology is one way to go, but ski-area operators must keep an eye on evolving ideas that might represent key components of snowmaking’s future. Enter the Israeli company IDE, which has come to snowmaking via an unusual route. Originally (and still primarily) a desalination company, IDE moved into the cooling and refrigeration business, focusing on mine cooling, before adapting its Vacuum Ice Maker technology for snowmaking machines in 2004.









IDE Technologies offers a system that can make snow at any temperature, but at a price. The company is developing smaller, more affordable systems.



IDE’s technology can make snow at any temperature, making it a warm-weather solution “to fill in the gaps” in the early season, says Zur Genosar, director of IDE’s Snowmaking and Cooling Solutions unit. There are a couple such IDE installations in Europe, but no U.S. resort has yet taken the plunge. With machines costing $3 million, Genosar concedes that the technology currently suits only bigger, destination resorts that need to guarantee snow for early-season travelers. He doesn’t see IDE technology replacing existing snowmaking equipment for prime snowmaking use.

However, he says that the company is working on smaller designs with a quarter to a third of the current machines’ capacity, and a fraction of their cost. He also says that there is a future potential for leasing machines for special events or needs. IDE was contacted (though not contracted) by Vancouver Olympic organizers before the 2010 Games for just such an emergency, when it appeared that warm weather might threaten the snowpack at some venues.

So while some ski areas are able to operate with 20-year-old equipment retrofitted with modern parts, others can at least dream about the technologies that the future might hold. With this past winter in mind, ski area managers might want to contemplate the prospect of making snow at South African temperatures not too far down the road.