Answer: Temporary

The correct answer is C (Temporary) based on Snowflake's official documentation and the community consensus. Snowflake explicitly recommends temporary tables for ETL workflows to store non-permanent, transitory data. Temporary tables exist only within the session and are automatically purged when the session ends, which eliminates storage costs and time-travel costs associated with permanent or transient tables. While some community members initially suggested D (Transient), the documentation and higher-upvoted comments clarify that temporary tables are specifically designed for session-specific ETL data, making them the most cost-effective option. Options A (External) and B (Permanent) are not optimal as they incur higher storage and time-travel costs.

Author: LeetQuiz Editorial Team