Winter Olympics 2022 Beijing May be Without Snow

Last Friday saw the awarding of the "2022 Winter Olympics" to Beijing beating the only candidate, Almaty, Kazakhstan by four points (44-40).

According to the International Olympic Committee (IOC), Beijing's "focus on sustainability, legacy and transparency" had been determining factors in the decision, BBC reports.

As might be expected, the statement received a lot of criticism. For one, Beijing is not known as an alpine territory compared to Almaty, which has snow-capped mountains all year round. Money-wise, Almaty is not far from Beijing as it is also financially secure, boasting of vast oil reserves. While Almaty has been the location of the 2011 Asian Winter Games, its portfolio is lacking in terms of hosting a major and international sporting event.

When the four European countries dropped out, leaving Beijing and Almaty to compete,  Kazakhstan's Prime Minister Karim Massimov delivered a moving speech. He reminded the IOC's long-standing tradition of awarding the Games to the underdogs.

"It was the IOC who took the Games to Tokyo 20 years after World War Two, to Moscow during the Cold War. Today we ask you to have faith in us, faith in Kazakhstan. Almaty is golden opportunity to show smaller, advancing nations can host the Games," he said. Clearly detached, the IOC awarded the opportunity to host to Beijing.

Beijing made history as it is now regarded as the first to host both the summer (2008) and winter (2022) editions, notes Reuters. Going forward, however, it is now faced with a season-specific predicament: bone-dry winters.

The New York Times' Juliet Macur expressed her disappointment, saying, "It's a sad day when the International Olympic Committee cannot even clear one of the lowest bars for choosing the host city for the Winter Games: snow."

Macur added: "While the Almaty bid's slogan was 'Keeping It Real', Beijing's could have been, 'Keeping It Impractical'. The IOC obviously isn't aiming for authenticity."

It was reported that skiing competitions are to be held 155 miles outside of Beijing and the other 100 miles away. Aside from the inconvenience that would possibly be resolved by constructing a high-speed train, there are 1,500 residents that might lose their homes in the process.

February, when Winter Olympic games are expected to open, it has been predicted that the city will have an average of 40 degrees - a highly unlikely temperature to form snow. According to Los Angeles Times' James Queally, though, with millions of money, Chinese officials should be able to craft and maintain enough man-made powder.

"In Sochi, Russian officials launched a multimillion-dollar program to counter the warmth. More than 400 machines were used to create snow, and organizers stored more than 700,000 cubic meters of snow pack as a fail-safe," Queally wrote.