With the recent move to a snowy winter climate, there has been an abundance of discussion regarding snow removal from our streets and driveways. Are the de-icing methods we use good for our cars, our roads, and most important, ourselves and the Earth?
The most commonly used method of snow removal is a de-icing chemical called sodium chloride (rock salt). It’s the same stuff we put on our food to make it taste better. Millions of tons of this salt are spread on our streets and roadways countrywide. But when the snow melts, where does all that salt go?
The salt dissolves, mixing with the water. The chloride ends up in the Earth’s soil and in turn, back into the water, affecting everything from important bacteria, the trees, small and large mammals, birds, fish, and all the way up to humans. Only a slight increase in chloride within the soil can kill off the bacteria that helps break down plant matter, which in turn can affect the soil’s fertility and erosion rate.
Chloride can also change plant systems. Plants that are especially sensitive to chloride increases, such as Pine Trees being over thrown and choked out by other native species of plants that can tolerate higher chloride levels such as Cattails.
As for our flying feathery friends, they can’t tell the difference between pebbles; required for their proper food digestion; and salt granules. Swallowing a few large road salt granules can be fatal to birds. Animals such as deer, elk, moose, etc. will lick the salt off the road which puts them directly in harm’s way of our cars and traffic.
Road salt, although having little effect on human health, can be tasted in our drinking water after a winter that needed heavy salting. Increased levels of salt intake can cause high blood pressure, or make already high blood pressure, worse. Most of the effects of sodium chloride towards humans is seen through corrosion of our home’s plumbing, cars, bridges, and structures made from steel, as well as the corrosion of the land we build on.
There are more environmentally friendly options that can be used. Calcium Magnesium Acetate is less harmful to the Earth and still works at lower temperatures. A nitrogen fertilizer called Urea can also be used and it will help plants as it melts ice. Potassium Chloride does the same thing to a degree – but the chloride still ends up in the Earth’s soil.
The Vancouver Olympic Committee chose a product called SafePaw , a de-icer that is supposedly environmentally safe and animal friendly, to clear the snow from surrounding delicate ecosystems. Missouri is using a mixture of rock salt and beet juice to keep roads clear. Illinois invented a fluid receptacle de-icing system. The receptacle is configured with a sensing unit and a heating element to heat fluid within the fluid receptacle which in turn heats the pavement to prevent ice from forming. Maine uses a product called Ice B’Gone; a deicer that uses a measured amount of sugar added with the chloride salt allowing longer time-effectiveness, and reduces corrosion as well as reducing the overall impact on the environment. Ice B’Gone is environmentally effective and meets the strict requirements of the Pacific Northwest Snowfighters Association (PNS) for corrosion and toxicity, as well as aiding in significant corrosion reduction. South Dakota is developing a new non-corrosive deicer from sodium carbonate and waste-wood products. Although, it is too early in the developmental process to know about its environmental impact. And finally, Oregon uses a combination of an eco-friendly anti-icer/de-icer and pure lava rock to keep the snow and ice at bay. The anti-icer/de-icer is chosen from the Pacific Northwest Snowfighters Association Qualified Products List, that provides no impact on streams or fish. The lava rock is used instead of sand and is picked up and recycled after the snow and ice have melted.
