Snowmaking begins at National Alpine Skiing Center in Yanqing

With the 2022 Winter Olympics 80 days away, organizers have begun to make artificial snow at the National Alpine Skiing Center.

The center, located in the Yanqing competition zone, is set to host the Alpine skiing competitions at Beijing 2022.

Wu Gaosheng, operations manager at the center, said that the snowmaking work is expected to last until mid-January.

A series of water-conserving and recycling designs have been put into place to optimize water usage for snowmaking, human consumption and other purposes, according to the Beijing 2022 organizing committee.

Around 90 percent of the snow used at the Alpine skiing venue for the PyeongChang 2018 Winter Olympics was reportedly artificial, while artificial snow was also a feature of Vancouver 2010 and Sochi 2014.

The center is the first Olympic-standard Alpine ski venue in China with a maximum vertical drop of about 900 meters. It has seven slopes.