#368 Festivals, Air Conditioning, and Ways to Utilize Troublesome Snow

Hokkaido has a lot of snow.
Every year, damage caused by heavy snowfall makes the news.

"We received a report from the police that a shop collapsed due to snow"... This is no laughing matter.
For Hokkaido, damage caused by snow is not a laughing matter.

However, Hokkaido is effectively utilizing that troublesome snow.
Effectively utilizing snow is called "snow utilization."

The most obvious example of this is likely the "Sapporo Snow Festival."

The Sapporo Snow Festival began in 1950 when local middle and high school students set up six snow statues.

Starting in 1955, the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force also began participating to create large-scale snow statues, and the scale and design of the statues have become more sophisticated year by year.

Nowadays, performances that combine snow statues with projection mapping are also held.

The ways to use snow are not limited to festivals.

Snow is used to cool and store agricultural products harvested locally.
It is, so to speak, a "natural refrigerator."

By storing them at low temperatures using snow, it prevents the deterioration of vegetables, and it is said that it also has the effect of increasing the sweetness of items like potatoes.

Also, because it saves electricity, it has the effect of reducing carbon dioxide emissions.

Truly, a "nuisance becomes a mountain of treasure."

Furthermore, in Hokkaido, mangoes that can be harvested in winter are also being grown by using snow to regulate the temperature. Click here for details ↓

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