Driveway heating

[prd2hnt]

Lurked around for a while now. Lots of good info. Wanted to run something by all the great minds here.

A buddy mentioned reading somewhere about using ground heat to keep a Nebraska driveway clear, to the extent possible, of snow and ice.

The idea is to drill a 6 inch hole down below the frost line, to something like 55 inches. Place a PVC pipe in the hole to ground level, surround with gravel. Place a screen over the pipe and pore the concrete as usual over the screen.

The theory being the warm ground air keeps the slab warm. I don't remember the number but was something like a pipe in every 2 ft square under the pad.

Anybody ever heard of this? Sounds kind of interesting. I have a new place going up in the country and I am tempted to try it.

Brian

 

[kwb210]

My parents condo has a heated driveway. Just like a heated floor, there are hot water coils in the concrete and there is a large hot water tank in the garage. Flip a switch and the tank heats up and then the pump runs the hot water in a circle, defrost!

 

[IDASHO]

Anywhere that gets real winter, and real snow, it will only be a waste of energy. Traction sand, for what it costs, and how well it works, goes a LONG way.

Plus, unless you have your drainage plan down to a science, what happens to the moisture??

I see a sheet of ice you have to cross just to get to your oasis of heated driveway

 

[ScaldedDog]

I'm thinking of doing this same thing, in an area outside a north facing internal garage and an east facing detached one. It is a flat area, though, so I'm concerned about the drainage issue.

Mark

 

[JohnK007]

Some of the rich folks in the town north of me have these in their million dollar homes. I think their's are based on circulating hot water like KWB210 mentioned. Not sure though. The one guy I knew had his installed when he had his house built so I'm sure they figured drainage into the equation.
Using a passive system with PVC pipe is a new one on me. I'd be curious to see how this works out.

 

[thammel]

Well, I did this myself - installed a heated driveway. I used delta-therm buried electric heating. You don't heat the entire driveway, only two tire tracks on the hilly or bad areas. If anyone is interested in the details, I can write pages on it. It draws a lot of current so be ready for that. As I recall I ran four 30 amp 240 volt circuits to do it. I had the system embedded in an asphalt pour. I did all the planning and all the wiring including laying the heating wire out on the old driveway. It was expensive and was a lot of work. I had to move from that house and now I have a flat driveway so I don't need it to be heated and I just pay a guy $30 to plow. I think I heated 175' length and the total system probably cost me close to $10,000 in parts.

Tom

 

[rsanter]

do a web search for home power or off grid power. I was reading an article where a guy installed htdronic floor heating that was solar powered. he built a black lined box on the side of his shed with black ABS pipes in it. a small pump circulated the fluid indoors. he said it worked well and he lived in snow country.
you could do something similar on your roof and pipe to the driveway

you can also do a modified version of GSHP where you drill down below the frost line and install tubing and circulate with a small pump


bob

 

[PAToyota]

I can't see the original idea working that well. I really doubt that you will get enough heat transfer to melt snow and ice.

I've done a couple systems where we had refrigerated warehouses and took the waste heat from the chillers and ran it through tubing installed in the sidewalks and loading dock pads to melt snow and ice - everything was properly drained, though. The only way that worked efficiently was that it was waste heat - I'd hate to have to pay to heat that much area up!

 

[chadincolo]

Lurked around for a while now. Lots of good info. Wanted to run something by all the great minds here.

A buddy mentioned reading somewhere about using ground heat to keep a Nebraska driveway clear, to the extent possible, of snow and ice.

The idea is to drill a 6 inch hole down below the frost line, to something like 55 inches. Place a PVC pipe in the hole to ground level, surround with gravel. Place a screen over the pipe and pore the concrete as usual over the screen.

The theory being the warm ground air keeps the slab warm. I don't remember the number but was something like a pipe in every 2 ft square under the pad.

Anybody ever heard of this? Sounds kind of interesting. I have a new place going up in the country and I am tempted to try it.

Brian

Might work, it's called a heat well. Common way to keep livestock watering tanks clear of ice, a 2 foot diameter hole, fill with rocks, surround with concrete, place metal tank on top, fill with water. Typically works down to about 0 or so in our part of the country, even then keeps the ice thin...

 

[NWOhioChevyGuy]

I work with a company that sells equipment for snow melt projects here in Michigan. They are typically large municipal buildings, hotels, YMCA's, etc. that install the systems. They use pex tubing in the slab and heat it just like in a house / garage.

The whole key is to sizing it right, at a certain air temperature all system's will meet thier limit and won't keep up. This is where you get the icing, if sized right and drained properly the system will keep things dry as indoors.

I don't see the system suggested working.