Industrieschnee

Description

Industrieschnee, or anthropogenic snow, is a wintertime meteorological phenomenon whereby local emissions of water vapour, usually from an industrial source, lead to snowfall downwind. In Munich (Germany), anthropological snowfall in known locally as bierschnee due to the many breweries found in close proximity to the city. The phenomenon also has been called industrial snowfall.

In Europe, it is usually associated with cold, stable, anticyclonic conditions, when surface fog (stratus) becomes super-saturated with water vapour, followed by ice nucleation and precipitation as light snow over a limited area of a few square miles.

In a comprehensive study of Industrieschnee in Switzerland spanning four consecutive winters from 1999 to 2003, an average of 4.5 days of anthropological snowfall were observed each winter at Zurich airport.