How can it be “too cold” to snow?
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[https://www.e-education.psu.edu/egee102/node/2102](https://www.e-education.psu.edu/egee102/node/2102)
If you look at the first chart you can see that at lower temperature the maximum amount of humidity the air can hold go down. At around 0 Fahrenheit or -18 Celcius the air need to be close to the point of humidity saturation for snow to fall, which doesn’t always happen. If you drop your temperature below that, it become harder and harder to meet the condition for snow to fall. The air simply can’t hold enough humidity for snow to form.
In order to snow there needs to be moisture in the air and if it’s too cold then water won’t really have much chance to evaporate or get into the air, even if it’s sublimating in direct sunlight. What little does get into the air will tend to condense at lower concentrations than at warmer temperatures. Thus you never have enough moisture to snow when it’s so cold outside.
Cold air has a harder time holding moisture than warmer air. If the air is too dry, it might be snowing higher in the atmosphere, but it evaporates before reaching grounds levels. Evaporate is the wrong technical term for snow turning into a gas, but it’s close enough.
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