Last week, I doubled the number of times I’ve driven over an hour to go Nordic skiing instead of skiing locally near Brunswick. The Bowdoin Nordic ski team usually trains at Pineland Farms in New Gloucester, but this winter we’ve had to drive to Quarry Road Recreational Center in Waterville to get on machine-made snow. With only two snowstorms providing enough snow to ski locally, we’ve been reliant on machine-made snow. Five out of six of our major Nordic races in New England have been on machine-made snow this season, and last season was similar.

There’s been a lot of talk about how this has felt like one of the warmest, most unstable winters for snow in New England. In January, Cumberland County got one big storm, but it rained three days later, melting it all. Ever since then, I excitedly check the weather, expecting to see snow in the forecast, but warm weather keeps appearing on my screen. I’ve been lucky to get 10 ski days in at Pineland Farms on natural snow, but most of the time has been on rock skis. The Pineland staff has been working hard on trails, but there just has not been enough snow in the region.

This winter is not an anomaly. The ski season in the United States has shortened by more than a month between 1982 and 2016, according to a study. Projections show that we can expect a 50% shortened ski season by 2050. If that doesn’t show climate change, I don’t know what does.

Trail systems with snowmaking have had more reliable skiing. In the short term, it seems like snowmaking is a solution to our unreliable winters. But machine-made snow is just a Band-Aid and ignores the bigger issue of climate change — a problem without an easy, definite solution. It’s scary to not know the future of Nordic skiing in Maine and New England, especially for places without snowmaking.

I have been part of several discussions about the need for snowmaking in Cumberland County, whether it be at Pineland or near Portland. School teams — from college to elementary school — need more access to snow to continue building a strong Nordic community. Some teams have the opportunity to travel elsewhere, but many do not, especially mid-week.

If our community continues to have conversations about snowmaking, we also should talk about its contribution to CO2 emissions. A recent report about the sustainability of snowmaking in Canada reveals that an average winter requires about 42 million cubic meters of machine-made snow and results in 130,095 tons of CO2 emissions. One article estimated that is equivalent to carbon sequestration from 155,141 acres of forest. We’re stuck in a cycle — make snow because of climate change, which leads to more emissions, which makes climate change worse. When planning for snowmaking facilities in Cumberland County, we should discuss options that have lower emissions; whether snow-making equipment’s electricity draws from clean energy; or we plan for offsets.

For a long time, I have been hesitant to speak out about this. In skiing, we talk about climate change, but certainly not enough. As a competitive Nordic skier, it is hard to call for action against climate change without sounding contradictory. Yes, I know I am part of the problem: my team drives all over New England to get on snow; I fly on planes for some competitions; and I often ski on machine-made snow. But our problems will only get worse if everyone is too afraid to speak up. Snowmaking and driving emissions make up a small sliver of national and global emissions, but as a skiing community, we can try to set a better example by acknowledging our ecological footprint and offsetting it. While it might feel like these actions don’t make much of a difference, the optics matter a lot. Skiers, environmental organizations and policymakers can work toward sustainable snowmaking goals.

Climate change is scary, especially in light of recent storms in Maine, but it is scarier when we do not talk about it enough. We shouldn’t have to wait for another devastating storm for climate change to make the headlines in Maine — it’s something we live with every day. Limited access to skiing is only one example of how it manifests in our lives. Machine-made snow is not a climate solution, but talking about doing it sustainably can get us a step closer to more ski days.

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