No snow? No problem. Downtown Stillwater will host the World Snow Sculpting Championship, which will be held Wednesday through Sunday.

The snow used to create the 10-by-10-by-10-foot blocks of sculpting snow must be pristine – as white as, well, you know – so a volunteer snowmaking crew from Afton Alps is creating a mountain of manmade snow in Lowell Park for the event.

“It needs to be clean snow,” Robin Anthony, the executive director of the Greater Stillwater Chamber of Commerce, said Friday afternoon. “This cold weather is going to be perfect for them over the weekend.”

The snowmaking crew from Afton Alps added a booster pump to its operation this year “to add additional capacity and power to the snowmaking unit,” said Trevor Maring, general manager of Afton Alps. “We can be even more efficient and effective with the snowmaking window that has presented itself.”

The key to making snow is understanding “wet-bulb temperature,” Maring said. That’s the lowest temperature to which air can be cooled by the evaporation of water into the air at a constant pressure.

“The magic number for making snow is a wet-bulb temperature of 27,” he said. “We’re currently down in the teens and single digits, which are optimal temperatures for us. That almost doubles our ability to make snow when it goes down that low – compared to the marginal temperature of 27.”

Afton Alps has lent one of its 150 snow guns to Stillwater for the snow sculpting championship.

“We have a portable snowmaking gun with a trailer that we hook up to a hydrant,” Maring said. “We take the water and shoot it up in the air, and it crystallizes and becomes snow before it hits the ground.”

Sculpting — and sledding?

Three-member snow-sculpting teams from around the world will be competing for $8,000 in prize money and the title of “World Champions,” Anthony said.

Teams from Canada, France, Germany, Turkey, Finland, Ecuador, Wales, Mexico and the U.S. are scheduled to compete.

Sculptors will have 64 hours – starting at 9 a.m. Wednesday – to carve their sculptures. Spectators can watch the entire process, visit with the teams and vote for their favorite sculpture; the team with the most votes will win “The People’s Choice Award.”

The prize money will be distributed thusly: $4,000 for first place; $2,000 for second place; $1,000 for third place and $1,000 for “The People’s Choice Award.”

This is the third year that Stillwater has hosted the event, which is sanctioned by Finland-based Association Internationale de Sculpture sur Neige et Glase. It brought an estimated 50,000 visitors to town last year, Anthony said.

The snowmaking crew from Afton Alps hopes to make enough snow to also construct a free sledding hill on Mulberry Point – north of Lowell Park – near P.D. Pappy’s, Anthony said.

A limited number of tubes and sleds will be available for visitors to use; visitors also are welcome to bring their own sleds, she said.

“As long as we are able to make enough snow for the sculptures and the artists first, we’re going to be transitioning and also making a sledding hill,” Maring said. “We’re excited to make this event even better.”

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This is the third year that Afton Alps has been involved in the event.

“We want to continue to be a strong partner for the community and make it happen,” Maring said.

The organizers of the World Snow Sculpting Championship are doing their part to keep the volunteer snowmakers warm and happy. They’ve provided a warming trailer, “and I keep bringing them treats,” Anthony said. “They’ve been a tremendous and important part of this.”

Afton Alps officials plan to have the winning team create a snow sculpture for the ski resort in Afton. “It’s something that is really cool for our guests as well,” Maring said.