As Rebecca Leber writes in The New Republic, with the winter games being held in Beijing, a naturally dry region, the city will have to create artificial snow. As she points out, “About four-fifths of China’s water supply is located in the south, but half of its population and two-thirds of its agriculture are in the north. That means China has already placed an unsustainable strain on its groundwater and aquifers.”
This is an incredibly irresponsible choice on behalf of the IOC and is contradictory to such efforts as Rio pledging to be more conscious of the environment. Then again, it’s not so out of line considering Sochi’s trail of environmental destruction (which was also a winter Olympics).
China’s great at bending nature against its will…