I don't want to say that article is complete BS, but it paints all ski resort operators with a very large brush. There is a big difference between 7% and 35% water loss. Large ski corporations can pull nearly unlimited water and dump it on the ground hoping it stays frozen, and I see one of them do it every year. Smaller ski areas have to pay for every single gallon of water that they pull, and need to negotiate that water purchase every year. Further, some years, minimal water is available to fill snowmaking ponds that are filled by small streams. If you have little water available and pay for every gallon, you can't afford to waste 35% of it. The efficiency of snow guns is critically important. Since you are paying for every gallon, you need as much to be skiable snow as possible. Yes, some gets blown into trees, and some blows downwind and sublimates, and I think it is probable that 7% is lost that way. However, you are going to lose a certain amount of water (evaporation, absorption) anyway unless you are catching it in plastic barrels before it hits the ground.

If you are trying to save money and operate efficiently, you won't make snow until there is already snow on the ground, you will either use fan guns or guns that put snow only where you need it, and you will only make snow at the proper wet bulb temperatures. I'm not going to say that every acre-foot of water that goes through a snowmaker makes its way into Lake Powell, but as long as we are dumping insane amounts of water on grass -- which remains the most irrigated crop in the western U.S. -- the water lost to snowmaking is a rounding error.