DEA-C02 Storage and Data Protection Practice Question
When a large production table is cloned to a development environment using the CLONE keyword, how is the initial storage for the cloned table billed?
⚠ Common exam trap
Candidates often assume that cloning a table instantly duplicates the physical storage and incurs immediate storage costs, forgetting that zero-copy cloning only shares metadata and micro-partitions until a modification occurs.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
No additional storage is billed until the cloned table or the source table is modified.
Snowflake's zero-copy cloning feature works by duplicating the metadata of the source table without copying the underlying micro-partitions. Because both the source and the clone point to the same immutable data blocks initially, there is no additional storage cost until data in either table is modified or new data is added.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
The clone is billed at 50% of the original table's storage rate until it is modified.
Why it's wrong here
Snowflake does not use a percentage-based billing model for clones. The storage is either shared (zero cost) or unique (full cost). There is no mechanism that charges a half-rate for cloned data, as the system tracks exactly which micro-partitions are unique to each specific table.
- ✗
The storage cost is doubled immediately because a physical copy of the data is created.
Why it's wrong here
Snowflake does not perform a physical copy of data during a CLONE operation. Instead, it leverages its metadata layer to point the new table at the existing micro-partitions. This design prevents the immediate doubling of storage costs and allows for near-instantaneous creation of very large datasets.
- ✓
No additional storage is billed until the cloned table or the source table is modified.
Why this is correct
Initial cloning only creates new metadata entries. As long as the micro-partitions remain identical between the source and the clone, no new storage is consumed. Only when DML operations create new micro-partitions will the storage usage diverge, and Snowflake will bill for the unique data blocks.
- ✗
Only the metadata storage is billed, which is a flat fee of 1 credit per month per clone.
Why it's wrong here
Metadata storage is managed by Snowflake and is not billed as a flat credit fee per clone. While metadata does consume some internal resources, the primary billing for storage is based on the actual bytes of micro-partitions stored in the cloud provider's object storage service.
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JA
Written and reviewed by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
Last reviewed September 2026 · checked against the official Snowflake exam blueprint
This DEA-C02 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Snowflake certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the DEA-C02 exam.