The idea is that they take off each morning in an A-Star helicopter to spend the day visiting virgin snow in the nearby Coastal Range before touching back down on the deck. While they enjoy luxury accommodation and splendid food, the helicopter – which accommodates four skiers plus a guide – is lashed to the deck for the night. While the skiers are off enjoying what they hope will be perfect powder, the yacht moves up the British Columbia coast, enabling the heli-skiers to launch themselves into a new area each day. The 230ft yacht, Absinthe, has 11 double cabins, carrying a total of 22 people. Each “stateroom” has an en-suite bathroom, stereo/DVD, plasma or LCD flat screen TV, satellite/cellular phone and email/web access, and “large portholes” to view passing wildlife.

However, the “year-round skiing” mantle has been quickly taken up by Zermatt, in Switzerland.With Alpine days – such as we know them – looking numbered, it is hard to imagine that the need for a quick profit will not triumph over conservation.GIVE ME THE FACTSThis winter the Ski Club of Great Britain (0845 458 0784; ) is running a “green” holiday to Tignes. 1 On the move in your ski lodge

1 On the move in your ski lodge
Most heli-ski lodges remain rooted to the spot while the clients whirr about in the mountains. Open to club members, the trip will run 15-22 January and costs £725 per person, including half board and travel on Eurostar.Sustainable Slopes (00 1 303 987 1111; ).Tourism Concern (020-7133 3330; .uk).. “This new policy is not comprehensive but it is a good start,” she says “Carbon emissions are not the only issue here. Mass tourism, overdevelopment, waste and energy consumption are also key problems that the Ski Club could help to persuade developers to tackle.”Tignes, the French resort that previously marketed itself as open for skiing 365 days a year, recently appointed an environmental officer and decided that it would be prudent to give the glacier some annual “days off”.

While this is an issue that divides ski experts and scientists alike, there is no doubt that the ski industry boom in recent decades has had a significant environmental impact.Tricia Barnett, director of Tourism Concern, a campaigning group of ethical and fairly traded tourism, believes the Ski Club’s policy is just the beginning of what is needed. What is disputed by a growing number of scientists, the environmentalist David Bellamy among them, is why this is happening.In a controversial article in the Daily Mail this summer Bellamy asserted that CO2 is not the cause of global warming but is rather a “natural phenomenon that has been with us for 13,000 years”. No one in the industry disputes that across the globe temperatures are rising and that ski resorts, especially low-lying ones such as those in Scotland and Austria, are under threat as a result. This kind of information source has previously proved popular with winter-sports lovers in the United States.