This month has been sweet indeed for carwash operators in Northern parts of the country — especially the Northeast. Larry Biasotto, owner of Glove Carwash in Delaware caught my attention by putting it this way: “Salt is our sugar.” Yes, that just about sums it up for carwash operators in areas lucky (or unlucky, depending on your perspective) enough to receive buckets of snow this February. Delaware was one of those states to get hit hard by snow and ice.

So far, the state has dipped into its 21 statewide “barns,” where salt is stockpiled, to the tune of about 15,700 tons. While tonnage figures for last year were not immediately available, Westhoff said, he checked around and learned anecdotally that the amount exceeded this year.

The 15,700 tons already has been replaced by International Salt of Clarkson, Pa., which supplies Delaware with the sodium chloride, he said, and DelDOT has restocked the barns to their 64,000-ton capacity.

The stuff spread on roads is almost pure salt, with a little anti-caking agent mixed in, he said. DelDOT mixes it with water to create a brine for its pre-snow salting. After it snows, the salt is poured on without the water, with the strategy that traffic will break down the large granules and mix it in with the ice and snow.

That’s one reason less-traveled roads often remain snowy, he said, because the salt hasn’t been broken down.

This year, the salt has outlived its welcome because the snow hasn’t been deep enough to plow, which usually would scrape the salt off the roadway, too, Westhoff said. [read more...]