a few things...

first, while i run a cold air intake on my car, i do not drive my car in snow...but i DO drive it in the winter until the first snow...i just avoid the salt. my cvar does stumble very slightly once in a great while right at start up, but when it is cold out, i have never had any real problems. your vehicle should be equipped with an intake air temp sensor of some sort, which will accomodate for the cold clean air.

second, while i have often heard of the dreaded "hydrolock", which comes from picking up water in a cold air intake, i have NEVER EVER met anyone who has experienced it, and i have worked for several shops, and a dealership. my filter on my stratus is about 4 inches from the ground, in front of my drivers side front tire, and even in very very hard rain, or riding behind a semi in a hard rain, which produces alot of addition spray, ive never noticed any missing or anything due to the moisture. for hydrolock to happen, you would have to basically submerge the car in water...so while its not impossible, it is hard to do, and the stories that i have heard, from "someone who heard from someone who heard" is usually something like "this guy was driving in a bad storm, and the water only looked a few inches deep, but it turned out to be a couple feet deep"...and lets be honest, with a compact car, if you get into a couple feet of water, youll have troubles with even the stock intake system. i woudl think that on your SUV, the filter will still be pretty far off the ground, right?

the only real downside of a CAI that i know of is the sound, which some people dont like...it creates some more engine noise...and some people dont like that. on the stratus, it sounds like i have a big vacuum leak in the fascia...