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The ULTIMATE snow melt pit...
PJO_5
Member Posts: 199
the discharge off the pump to a small clarifier that will also have a scraper for floatables. They rent them here, so I'm sure they have them in Colorado. A 3" fitting w/ dog ears at the bottom for an occasional visit by the honey truck, and an overflow pit for the floaties to a similar box...Highland Tank company comes to mind.
It will take up some of the precious parking lot room though ;-)
It will take up some of the precious parking lot room though ;-)
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Comments
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What all needs to be considered...
Wallies, I've been asked by a local developer to submit preliminary design/build proposal with budgetary number for a LARGE snowmelt system for a retail outlet store in the mountains of Colorado. The melted surfaces equal around 30,000 square feet. Not a real problem from my experience. The kicker is, they want a "melt pad", which is an idea I inadvertently put into one of their CE's minds as a retrofit consideration for an existing operation they have in the mountains as well.
Some cities require a certain percentage of snowmelt in order to avoid having to dedicate a large portion of the parking lot for on site snow storage. This on site snow storage is killer during peak snow periods, because if the consumer can't find an easy place to park, they'll keep on driving and go someplace else to spend their hard earned money.
Anyway, back to the idea of the snow melt pad. My original thought was to place 3/4" tubing at 6" OC, just below the surface of the concrete, for an area of around 5,000 sq. feet. The real question becomes, what would the potential energy load be if large dump trucks start hauling large loads of snow to the melt pad?
Then, I began thinking, if a person REALLY wanted to melt a LOT of snow REAL fast, it would make more sense to have a snowmelt PIT. In my minds eye, the pit would be approximatley 20foot by 20 foot square, 5 foot deep, made of concrete, insulated with 6" XPS insualtion all around with access from all four sides. 2 feet up from the bottom, there would be 3" type L copper pipes run horizontally with approximatley 3" gaps between them, with hot glycol being circulated inside of them.
In the bottom of the pit, there would be sewage grade grinder type sump pumps connected to a PVC piping system that would go to each of 4 corners of the square pit.
In the very center of the pit, at a heighth of around 4 foot off the bottom, there would be an inverted double 90 (180 degree fitting) that would act as the weir for the whole operation. Operation would be as follows;
During periods of non use, water would be maintained at 35 degrees F to avoid unnecessary wasting of energy. Upon being activated, attached mod con boilers would boost the water temperature to 140 degrees F. 40 foot tractor trailer end dumps could then back up to the pit, hoisting their trailers, thereby dumping snow and ice into the pit. The sump pumps would then turn on, spraying the relatively warm water onto the snow, thereby enhancing its melt down and conversion back to water.
As the snow/ice melts, it would flow by gravity out of the pit through the inverted weir fitting directly into an oil/grease seperator where all petro chemicals would be removed by a monthly visit from a pumping truck. The heavy solids, (sand, grit and other solids) would naturally accumulate in the pit for later removal by a sand pumping truck.
The water would then flow back to the stream and or river via the local storm drain facility, in cleaner shape than it would have been had it just been allowed to melt naturally.
I can forsee a HUGE market for this in the ski resort towns where snow storage is a real issue. Denver is struggling with this very problem right now.
Cities could operate the pits, and charge the private snow haulers by the pound to convert the frozen products into water, thereby creating a revenue stream (pun intended) that could rival the charges they get for domestic sewerage charges.
They could even possibly truck the treated water back up the hill to the ski resorts, and let them turn it back into snow again, applying it to the slopes where its SUPPOSED to be.
The water lawyers wouldn't be able to say anthing about it, because once its all said and done, it ends up flowing back into the same river/drainage system it would have ended up in anyway...just a little delayed in getting there.
The system could be agumented with evacuated tube solar collectors, which coud also store thier excess summer energy in the soil beneath the parking lot, therby making it as green as possible.
Looks to be a win win proposition to me...
What thinks ye wallies?
ME0 -
Why not
You could use 3" steel pipe and put stands with cradles to keep the tubes from bending or buckling under the wieght of End Dumps full of compacted, plowed snow (that stuff is HEAVY). Good idea with the sand and grease interceptors. Properly filtered, the water could be put back into the augmentation storage ponds, or into the stream, or used to make snow back up on the slope where it does more good. I saw a mobile snowmelt machine that had a hopper on it that snow was dumped into to be scorched by a giant diesel-fuel burner. Very Ugly.0 -
sounds good
We just did a snow melt job for a small block.
The job was in 4 quarters with one boiler running each.
The problem they faced was no room to put snow.
Now they melt it! Half the system has been working fine for about a month now. Kinda proud of it.
Sounds like you may have found that golden idea.
Run with it!! Make millions!0 -
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If it flies
Hi Mark, I know up here in Glenwood the EPA won't let the city dump snow in the rivers anymore. Thirty years ago it was SOP. bob0 -
like that...
except a LOT more environmentally friendly.
I heard their units produce a LOT of carbon monoxide.
Mine would produce a lot less CO, and mine would clean the water instead of just dumping it into the nearest stream/river.
Let's face it. Snowmelting is a frivality with a precious resource. We should use it (energy and water) wisely.
Reduce, re-use and re-cycle.
ME0 -
Funny thing...
In most cases, it (the pollutants) are going to end up in the river any way...
Our goverment dollars at work.
ME0 -
Snowmelting
In my area about 10 years ago, there was a late season 3ft snowstorm. The local city decided to haul all their snow removal to the banks of the Hudson River, thinking it would just melt and disappear into the river. Well the snow mound finally disapeared in late May early June. The leftover garbage and sand/salt was disgusting. A private individual would have had the EPA & DEC all over them. I like your idea, it seems to be the "cleanest" way to deal with this problem. Or you guys in CO could keep selling it on Ebay.0 -
A question Mark
Do you sleep at night
Your mind never seems to stop ! It seems like a great idea and well thought out.
How about a drawing so I can get my mind around the Wier ?
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From someone that has never
Seen a whole lot of snow at one time...
Your design seems sound, but what about the trash (cups, bottles, refrigerators, etc.)that would end up in the pit over time? The sand truck may not be able to handle
We all know that humans are nasty and will throw trash virtually anywhere if it get it out of their sight.
Also, as someone else mentioned, another concern would be about the 180° fittings, I'd be worried about them breaking off if they were too high when the compacted snow hits them.0 -
Agreed
Mark's mind is a "Hydronic Steel Trap" while my mind, advancing slowly, is more in line with pipe-cleaners.
A couple of things came to mind albeit slowly, 3/4" tubing 6" OC, hopefully it is a hybrid "leapfrogging" counter-flow method, because bending it might prove to be a chore. If you do manage to bend it, you might have another career in the UFC (Ultimate Fighter Championship)
Last time I checked, Nebraska was still East of the Rockies and we are the beneficiaries of the spring thaw and subsequent run-off. Even though the river levels are down, this system in LARGE scale could be a pre-emptive strike at flood-control. Yes, I know that it is far-fetched conceptually, but with only one cup of coffee in me, I had just enough in me to spell conceptually. (Twice)
Regards,
PR0 -
that sounds like a credible system.
"lot less advanced system" at the mall,that evolved was... a 4 plex was torn down along side the mall. it was a large field with a concrete basement ,"Pit"...... one winter.
The drainage was 4: abs, in crete, by default of the basement plumbing....no heat .
the loaders would pick up the snow and dump it into the hole,every Spring we would send out the clean the parking lot team out to pick up trash. a couple years went by,...the city then began to clean snow off the streets and the snow Trucked In ! dumped on sight...and each spring the trash situation became worse....
i wonder, could this be something you need to get in writing from public works..(?).just to let them know, beforehand, that it is not a public right, to dump city snow and trash into or around your snowmelt pit.:)
By Default once again , the snow was removed when it was warm and snowing, the snow would be more like slush as the graders the loaders and scrapers and trucks added their own work energy input during "removal"...the drainage would be heated as it were from the venting characteristics of the city sewer drainage system tie in into the basement...all i can say is. that it was a solution....the old car bodies is where we had to draw the line in the snow:)0 -
Sleep???
We don't need no stinkin sleep!
Truth be known, I dream in hydronics. In color hydronics...
I'll have to work on the drawing process later. The reason for the inverted ell is to keep trash (the floating type) from getting out of the melter and into the dirt/oil seperators. It would be made of a heavier pipe, say cast iron...
Paul, think of a bobby pin, over lapped pattern at the ends. In other words, a large loop, with the bodies of the loops over lapping, but the tube staying on 6" centers. The whole grid would be on a 4 way reversing valve. Gotta use them big four ways for something now that they're not needed for boiler/slab protection...
It has been done by lesser men then me, many times over:-)
ME0 -
Something tells me you need to make a model at some reasonable scale to test the concept.
The water spraying over the top is coming from the melting snow and ice, correct?
144 btu/lb required to change ice at 32F to water at 32F. Pit has a capacity of 20 * 20 * 5 = 2,000 cubic feet. Compacted snow weighs at least 20# per cubic foot while ice comes in at about 60# per cubic foot. As the water sprays over the top it will certainly melt some of the snow/ice, but unless it can essentially melt its way through to the bottom of the pit continually (VERY unlikely) the remaining snow/ice will become ever more compact. The liquid water plus the snow/ice it has melted will find their way to the bottom of the pit via the sides. If it doesn't drain to the sides, it will pool on the top where it will cool rapidly to 32F then try to freeze from its contact with the air. Evaporation will only speed the rate at which it will freeze.
I can honestly see a huge, semi-solid and very slow melting ice cube floating floating in a swimming pool filled with a tepid chemical bath...0 -
Hence, sewage grinder pumps....
There would be large prt wye strainers with auto blow downs, as well as vortec solid particle seperators, again with automatic blow downs, discharging into the sand/oil seperators.
It would NOT be maintenance free....
In fact, I think it would require a full time operator. We're talking about a BUNCH of btuH here, and we're taking about a BUNCH of flow here as well. I envision the melter running at night, when the parking lot is not being used for parking, making access a breeze to the haulers.
ME0 -
This could be a GREAT application..
of the Purple Pipe*~/:) Think about it and take some pic's
it was 3:40 a.m. here when i jolted up to another fine day:)) a brother in the technicolor:)0 -
why not...
a pit heated by steam? Easier to control and doesn't require antifreeze for massive snow melting.
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Copper would concern me
road salt, etc really goes after that. I suppose a guard rail system would be needed also, around qa "pit". Dealing with the melt water will be the sticky issue no doubt.
I know St Louis and several other airports have melt pads. I wonder that the melt water passes through the bio ponds before heading down the sewer, considering the de-ice chemicals and all.
hot rod
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Don't forget
Your gonna need a retractable clear cover/roof with solar reflectors to really heat up the interior when closed.0 -
Heat requirements:
Say the pit is 80% snow/ice and 20% water.
2000 cubic foot pit * 80% = 1,600 cubic feet of snow/ice. Believe you need to consider that snow/ice weighing at least 50# per cubic foot.
1,600 * 50# = 80,000# of snow/ice to melt.
144 btu required to turn 1# of snow/ice at 32F to 1# of water at 32F. 80,000 * 144 btu = 11,520,000 btu required just to convert to water.
Say you want the water in the pit to be at least 50F before you spray back over the top. Assuming it's naturally going to be 32F, that's 2,000 * 20% = 400 cubic feet of water weighing 400 * 62# = 24,800#. To get it to 50F requires 24,800 * 18 = 446,400 btu. BUT, you're continually spraying this water back over the top where it cools via its contact with the air and via evaporation. Say you spray 20 gpm. Over an hour that would be 20 * 60 = 1,200 gpm. 1,200 gallons * 8.33# = 9,996 pounds of water in an hour. Now lets say that half of the energy above 32F in the 50F water is lost to the environment. 9,996# * 9 = 89,964 btus.
Add everything together:
11,520,000 btu to change the snow/ice to 32F water.
446,400 btu to maintain the pit water at 50F.
89,964 btus lost from spraying (I suspect this is way low...)
12,056,364 btus that go exactly where you want them to melt a full load in one hour. It's the btus that go exactly where you want them part that troubles me. The sprayed water had very little melting power so the vast majority of the melting would occur at the sides and bottom. Again, I can see that ice cube in a tepid swimming pool...0 -
Just brainstorming
If it's big enough and deep enough, it doesn't need a boiler or any energy input. Even in Summit, there's an unlimited supply of free heat at 50+ deg. F. The pit is lined with a filter that is replaced or cleaned annually. It may need an insulated lid, but a few feet of snow is good insulation.There was an error rendering this rich post.
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our recplex -
has a snow melt pit - several hundred feet of 1.5 inch A53 on constant circ. Heat source is the second cut out of the ammonia coolers from the ice making plant - that's it. Circulation water averages 70 deg F. It takes about 20 hours to melt all the ice from one hockey game which is 4 -5 cleanings. Zamboni dumps directly - does not have to go outside. Overall the pit is 10x10x20. Works well - first cut out of ammonia chillers preheats DHW.0 -
simple experiment
pack a pot full of snow, put it on the stove and time the melt.
take a second pot with a drain at the bottom, time its melt.
as mike swamp is talking about, you may find the non draining pot takes longer to melt?
why not an "extruder" solution? like in plastic molding, where an auger gets smaller and smaller, you use friction/compression to move and melt the snow?0 -
pervious concrete
is the current rage around here. Basically it is concrete without sand that allows water to pass through. It's been used for years in greenhouses and now developers are putting it down in parking lots to get away from retention ponds and the expensive ground that they consume.
Although you may still need to "clean up" the discharge from the pit.
hot rod
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Haven't heard of the "pervious" concrete but haven't heard of a lot of things. Sounds neat, but what about pockets of water that get trapped and freeze?0 -
transfer rate
Maybe I'm crazy, but it seems like a way to melt the snow without passing the heat through concrete would work much faster. How about putting zoned, replacable (iron? PVC? HDPE?) coils near the bottom of the tanks? It would transfer heat a LOT faster than tube in concrete. It seems like it would be better if the heat exchanger was not at the bottom because you do not want to heat the water you just melted from the snow before it finds its way to the drain. Maintain the tank floor just above freezing to make sure it drains.
Just some thoughts. Sounds like a very cool project.0 -
A hypocaust
is what you need. Screw the whole tubing issue Build a fire under that concrete pit!
Do as the Danes do and build a trash burning device to create the thermal energy. They generate district heat with the trash burners and recover the metals from the ash, as I understand it. Mike Chiles and a group traveled Denmark and observed clever alternate energy facilities last summer. Real interesting stories. R. Bean has some good ones also.
I'm a bit leary of consuming enourmous amounts of fossil fuel to melt snow for motorist convience
hot rod
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Thanks Mike. Here are the conceptual drawings...
I've decided that the hot copper pipes do need to be near the top, to meet the incoming frozen products head on. I'd never intended to bury anything in the concrete of the pit. Will probably do some tube in the surface slab around the pit, but none in the pit, just the bare copper pipes with hot glycol flowing through them.
ME0 -
I'm afraid the dirt and grit woud render the pourous material...
non pourous in short order. The snow around here gets REAL dirty in short order. There would be LOTS of STUFF to be cleaned out of the pit, I fear...
ME0 -
RE: Hypocaust...
HR, in my REMless sleep last night, I came upon the same conclusion. Why burn perfectly good natural gas, when there is a TON of dead standing beetle kill trees around. Summit County is also in the process of putting in a major waste recycling plant. Other than the fact that the dump sits directly above Lake Dillon, a major source of water for Denver, I can't see why anyone would object :-)
THe problem with wood would be getting enough peletized wood to maintain a stoker boiler, and finding a wood burning boiler of adequate capacity, like 20 million btuH...
But I like your train of thought, and I'm sure the mountain municipalities would as well.
ME0 -
Lambert-Saint Louis International Airport (STL/KSTL), MO, USA
From - http://www.airport-technology.com/projects/lambert/
"As part of the expansion project, an innovative snow-melting system was installed at the terminal. The contractors installed hydronic radiant snowmelt tubing into a 160ft by 90ft concrete pad. When it snows, snow is ploughed onto the pad where it melts and drains into an adjacent retention pond. The system provides an efficient and inexpensive way of clearing heavy snow during severe winter storms."
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The snow melt pit for the zamboni at one of our rinks uses water in the pit heated by a single loop of copper at about 160.
Snow/ice dumped into the water melts quick.
You could use the same idea, sloped sides on the pit, relativly small water surface area, and the snow should melt quickly.
If you are going to need an operator, use a bobcat to feed the pit.0 -
interesting tread !
After reading this... Thought above having a heated vat for dumping and at bottom will have a auger turning the packed snow thru a heated tube(s), depending on the loads. Heated pipings wrapped around the tubes to reduce the direct contact and less corrisons with the snow etc. At the end where the melted pool going into the filteration, etc...
Wondering who building this for the city? I will ask my brother if his company ( CBI, Chicago Bridge & Iron) have done any of this here or overseas...0 -
Install some mirrors and large magnifing glassl
above the pit to increase the solar energy capture. Don't you have 250 plus days of sun at that location?
hot rod
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300 +...
Except maybe this year...
ME0 -
Blocks
Seems like an opportunity for a central warehouse storage facility where dump trucks could dump into a pit where snow would be compacted into blocks and then stacked/stored to provide summer indoor cooling comfort as it melts. Chust need a place for warmed rejected melt-water to go in summer & pumps to circulate chilled water to building comfort systems.
Energy costs for compaction vs energy costs to burn fossil fuels?0 -
compaction
At the bottom of a deep pit the compaction occurs for free, then the free geothermal heat takes over and melts it. It's like a low temp boiler working 24/7.There was an error rendering this rich post.
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Zamboni ice melter
We installed the radiant heat in a zamboni pit for the Buffalo sabres. The zamboni dumps its load of clean ice and then it slowly melts. They have found that they still need to spray hot water over the ice to melt it fast enough to keep up. I love some of your thoughts. We did this 6 years ago. We installed 3/4" tube 4"oc. in the concrete. Obviously you have way more issues to deal with and huge load. We were just trying to aid in melting and reduce the usage of hot fresh water.0 -
Configure the
pit so it can be used for a skateboarders park in the Summer. Dude! WW
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