Deicing chemicals as source of constituents of highway runoff

Transportation Research Record
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Abstract

The dissolved major and trace constituents of deicing chemicals as a source of constituents in highway runoff must be quantified for interpretive studies of highway runoff and its effects on surface water and groundwater. Dissolved constituents of the deicing chemicals—sodium chloride, calcium chloride, and premix (a mixture of sodium and calcium chloride)—were determined by analysis of salt solutions created in the laboratory and are presented as mass ratios to chloride. Deicing chemical samples studied are about 98 and 97 percent pure sodium chloride and calcium chloride, respectively; however, each has a distinct major and trace ion constituent signature. The greatest impurity in sodium chloride road salt samples was sulfate, followed by calcium, potassium, bromide, vanadium, magnesium, fluoride, and other constituents with a ratio to chloride of less than 0.0001 by mass. The greatest impurity in the calcium chloride road salt samples was sodium, followed by potassium, sulfate, bromide, silica, fluoride, strontium, magnesium, and other constituents with a ratio to chloride of less than 0.0001 by mass. Major constituents of deicing chemicals in highway runoff may account for a substantial source of annual chemical loads. Comparison of estimated annual loads and first flush concentrations of deicing chemical constituents in highway runoff with those reported in the literature indicate that although deicing chemicals are not a primary source of trace constituents, they are not a trivial source, either. Therefore, deicing chemicals should be considered as a source of many major and trace constituents in highway and urban runoff.

Suggested Citation

Granato, G., 1996, Deicing chemicals as source of constituents of highway runoff: Transportation Research Record, v. 1533, no. 1, p. 50-58, https://doi.org/10.1177/0361198196153300108.

Publication type Article
Publication Subtype Journal Article
Title Deicing chemicals as source of constituents of highway runoff
Series title Transportation Research Record
DOI 10.1177/0361198196153300108
Volume 1533
Issue 1
Publication Date January 01, 1996
Year Published 1996
Language English
Publisher National Academy of Sciences
Description 9 p.
First page 50
Last page 58
Additional publication details