DENVER, Colo. July 23, 2007 – Colorado ski resorts are deeply committed to reducing their toll on the environment while working to ensure sustainable businesses. Wind power, recycling, alternative transportation, and environmental partnerships are only a few ways in which Colorado resorts are forging a green path to sustainability. 
ALTERNATIVE ENERGY Through the purchase of wind power, Colorado ski resorts are keeping more than 241 million pounds of carbon dioxide out of the earth’s atmosphere annually. As leaders in this realm, 11 Colorado resorts, including Aspen Highlands, Aspen Mountain, Beaver Creek, Breckenridge, Buttermilk, Copper, Crested Butte, Keystone, Snowmass, Vail and Wolf Creek, offset 100 percent of their energy use by purchasing nearly 300,000 total mega-watt hours of wind power annually. Their purchase of wind energy is the equivalent of removing nearly 40,000 cars from North America’s highways. Winter Park has also committed that every new lift installed at the resort will be run by wind power.  Wind power is not the only resource Colorado resorts are utilizing to power their lifts. Steamboat Ski Resort opened what is considered to be the world’s first combined solar-wind powered lift on Friday, December 15, 2006. The Sunshine Express, a high-speed quad chairlift, is powered entirely by renewable solar and wind power and is believed to be the only chairlift in the nation to run on solar power. Steamboat’s commitment has the equivalent environmental impact of preventing the release of 899,760 pounds of carbon dioxide annually.
RECYCLING All 26 Colorado based ski resorts have a recycling plan implemented. Paper, cardboard, oil, antifreeze, iron, aluminum, and kitchen compost are just some of the resources that make up the millions of pounds of recyclables every year. Keystone’s creative composting efforts combine vegetable kitchen scraps from its top-ranked restaurants with wood shavings to create a rich fertilizing soil that is then used in landscaping throughout the resort, and diverts up to three tons of food waste from the landfill each month during the resort’s busiest months of operations. Due to its size and number of guests, Vail Mountain has the largest recycling program in North America and recycles approximately 62 percent of on-mountain waste, which equates to approximately one pound per guest. At the no frills ski area of Silverton Mountain, reusing is the ultimate form of recycling and the very foundation on which the resort is built...literally. The entire ski area has been built with recycled products; those donated and/or purchased used from other areas around the country. The base lodge was donated from the town of Silverton. The mountain’s only lift was purchased from Mammoth and all mountain vehicles were donated as were all handheld radios, furnishings, carpet, bar equipment, ski patrol toboggans, rope, and bamboo. And at Wolf Creek Ski Area, old tires are used as blasting mats on snow control days. ALTERNATIVE PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION In addition to transporting guests to and from ski resorts, resort shuttle systems, gondolas, trains and carpooling play major roles in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, fossil fuel demand, and traffic congestion in Colorado resort communities. Last year at Winter Park, nearly 32,000 employees and 700,000 visitors took advantage of the free community shuttle system that connects the mountain with the town and lodging properties throughout. With a ridership topping more than four million passengers, the Roaring Fork Transit Authority (RFTA) in Aspen recently added four more
Hybrid Buses to its fleet and pledged to increase the percentage of Bio-Diesel used in all buses. At Steamboat where the shuttles are run on biodiesel, more than 1.2 million guests and employees rode the shuttle system.
After its first year in operation, Powderhorn Ski Area anticipates an aggressive expansion of its shuttle service from Grand Junction to the resort.In total, more than 125 people utilized the new service each weekend of the 2006-07 winter season. At Monarch Mountain, more than 70 cars are removed from the Highway 285 thanks in large part to the daily employee shuttle service from Salida to the mountain. Gondolas, once used to transport people from within ski area boundaries are now playing a new role in transporting guests to the ski resorts. With newer gondolas able to transport up to 3,000 people or more per hour directly from the parking lot to base areas, these gondolas provide a clean and quiet connection from the mountain communities to the resorts. At Telluride, the gondola has eliminated the need for people to drive their vehicles while visiting the pristine community. Known throughout Colorado as one of the most scenic rides in ski country, the Telluride Gondola serves approximately three million guests per year. Designed specifically as a transportation option, the new Breckenridge gondola will significantly decrease traffic volumes and provide an annual savings of more than 20,375 gallons of fuel by resort shuttles. At Beaver Creek, families and individuals staying in the Town of Avon can begin their ski day with added comfort and convenience by riding the new Riverfront Express Gondola, anticipated to open during the winter season. The new eight-passenger gondola is 2,100 feet in length with nine towers, 18 cabins and can carry 1,200 people per hour – all within a short 400-foot walk from the Town of Avon’s new transit center and is expected to decrease traffic volumes and improve the winter vacation experience. ENVIRONMENTAL PARTNERSHIPS Numerous Colorado based ski resorts maintain environmental partnerships with environmental organizations of all sizes to ensure pristine forest land, clear blue rivers, abundant wildlife, habitat and forest access remain available for future generations. Copper Mountain, Steamboat and the Vail Resorts work with the National Forest Foundation (NFF) to create a lodging contribution program that encourages guests to make individual donations which NFF will match 50 percent. All proceeds will be used toward local conservation efforts in each of the resort’s individual forest districts.These combined efforts are expected to raise nearly $1 million
this season. The Environment Foundation is an Aspen Skiing Company non-profit employee organization dedicated to protecting and preserving the regional environment. In nearly ten years of existence, the Foundation, with its partners, has granted nearly one million dollars to local and regional environmental groups and projects. Retutn to Top | 
