Open AccessEstimation of road salt use based on winter air temperature
Author(s) -
Venäläinen Ari
Publication year - 2001
Publication title -
meteorological applications
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.672
H-Index - 59
eISSN - 1469-8080
pISSN - 1350-4827
DOI - 10.1017/s1350482701003085
Subject(s) - environmental science , air temperature , climatology , meteorology , salt lake , estimation , salting , atmospheric sciences , geography , geology , paleontology , chemistry , food science , management , structural basin , economics
The annual amount of salt used to prevent slippery conditions on roads was estimated with the help of winter monthly mean air temperatures. Air temperature is measured reliably at almost all meteorological stations and the use of air temperature for the estimation of road maintenance conditions is a tempting alternative compared with the use of more complicated indices calculated using meteorological observations available at only a small number of stations. It was found that in Finnish climatological conditions, warmer than normal weather in November and March and colder than normal weather in December, January and February reduces the need for salting. Warm mid‐winter months mean slippery conditions and, consequently, an abundant use of salt. The temperature explained about 60% of the annual variation of salt use and thus gave surprisingly good estimates for the salting amounts. Copyright © 2001 Royal Meteorological Society