The ULTIMATE snow melt pit...

Rich Kontny_3

Waste Heat

Mark,

I would feel better if you could find an industrial site or power plant with waste heat to utilize for that huge BTU demand.

Here in Wisconsin we can only have outdoor radiant to serve critical areas like hospital ramps, helicopter pads etc.

Years ago they made natural gas fired melt pits before gas became too expensive and this practice was considered too wasteful.

I have done a great deal of work for a company called "Pre-Heat" that does custom heat reclaim systems for industrial and power generation plants.

The snow melt system has merit if the heat source is of the reclaim nature!

Rich K.

Mike T., Swampeast MO

Could the copper tube near the top bear repeated dumping of tons of snow/ice? DID understand that the tube was always intended to be exposed and not "buried".

jp_2

why the pit then?

the larger the pit the more energy needed to heat your spray water, i would think of 1-2 ft deep max, put a steel mesh over the pit so just water drains into it.

ME_17

Question Pat...

What would be necessary to remove mag chloride?

Thanks

ME

[Deleted User]

Hot Water = inertia...

When large dump trucks start backing up to this thing, I don't want to have to wait long to get the next one in position. Hot H2o will have a head start on melting, and as we all know water holds a HECK of a lot more energy than air.

ME

archibald tuttle

proof positive that sunday mornings are for bluesky work

First thing I would do is remove all the inherent value judgments from the equation and let them be economic judgments. Why is it anymore or less 'wasteful' of energy to melt snow for our convenience to access the slopes and associated commercial development than to make snow to attract us there in the first place or run lifts to get us the hill, etc.? If getting snow out of the way bolsters local economics, then they will figure out where the energy comes from to pay for it and balance that against trucking it to timbuktu or lost business or additional parking lot area requirements.

Unfortunately, the whackos probably won't let you cut the beetle killed trees (see generic environmental response to timber sales providing quick access to dead and dieing timber - they portray it as a gambit to get around environmental laws).

Forgetting the heat source, there is a fair amount of fuel that is going to go into just trucking the snow never mind life cycle fuel investment in equipment etc. But your idea might still be more practical than installing mini versions at many dispersed locations (although that could be a way to test the concept) especially if you had a source of 'waste' heat that would be economically favorable.

When contributors start talking about heated augers, I wonder if the system is getting over complicated or undercomplicated. I would tend to revisit the assumption that this is going to be one big chunk.

I'm thinking if mechanical action is involved the thing to do would be to separate dumping and melting. You have a dump area where the underburden is fed to melting source by augers, flails,rough grinders, toothed conveyers or some yet to imagined materials handling device to create a broken up predictable stream at predictable rate to the actually melting heat source. The more pelletized the stuff is, the easier and more predictably it will melt and the earlier you can deal with separating trash, etc.

If you shrink the scale and install onsight and bucketloaders/plows deliver the snow directly to the system, less handling equals less compaction so materials handling within the system might be a little easier.

If you stick with a no external moving parts design along your original concept, how about just spraying the water from below the pipe grid at the bottom of the snow pile. So you are melting along a front of know size. The process is insulated from temperatures about and the snow pile comes down by gravity as it proceeds.

Waste water handlers have been working on floatable trash collection for years and probably have various ready made weirs / sumps that you could just add as a unit so when water under the pipes reaches a certain level it drains off.

If the pipes aren't directly strong enough to handle the weight/delivery methods of the snow pile, you could use I-beams or whatever seems the most sensible material. Salt corrosion is a problem with virtually everything, except maybe plastic. Plastic I-beams? Why not. Maybe Aluminum pipes tack welded to aluminum I-beams. Can't see Stainless, really but maybe if if I weren't daydreaming.

Brian

[Deleted User]

Excellent points

Thanks Brian. One way or another, I AM going to make this happen. Too many positives to let it slide IMHO.

ME

PJO_5

MgCl?

Not sure of the exact chemical description, but here's one take:

http://www.usda.gov/rus/electric/engineering/2001/magnesium_chloride.htm

Sounds like Colorado is already famous for this stuff. My worry would be the corrosion of the metal parts - including aluminum - in your "melter", but maybe this stuff isn't quite as bad.

I do know that this form of magnesium is tougher to remove via the "typical" water treatment of adding lime or soda ash for pH increase and the resulting settling that follows.

To answer your question, I would not think removing this would be a big priority - especially compared to "typical" raod salts - but keep an eye out for the initiation of corrosion...

Take Care, PJO

[Deleted User]

Thanks!

We are INTIMATELY aware of the corrosion 'benefits' of said chemicals, and recently some environmentalist were wondering outloud about the affects of it on the rivers and streams. I can tell you this much, prior to the use of MgCl on the roads, we had no issues with the trees along the highways. NOw, all the trees within a 50 foot path of the highway are dying or dead...

It is HELL on bridges and other metal super structures typically used in bridges...

ME