Marty Gordon
NRVsports@mainstreetnewspapers.com
The Virginia Department of Transportation has used about 450,000 tons of salt statewide since Jan. 1, spreading it on the roadways during the recent snowstorms. The process is the subject of a bill from the General Assembly directing VDOT to conduct an environmental study to find safe alternatives to road salt in winter weather.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), when winter passes and ice melts, road salt can make its way into nearby surface and systems and contaminate water reservoirs and wells. Excess road salt accumulation can also kill roadside plants and harm wildlife.
The bill, which was approved last week, directs VDOT to measure road salt’s impact on infrastructure, the environment and its “corrosive effects” on personal property. The study should then compare results with potential alternatives.
Dr. Joel Snodgrass, a professor and the department head of Virginia Tech’s Fish and Wildlife Conservation program, believes it is a good idea to look at this process closely and begin to figure out where can we cut back on uses, how can we become more efficient at using salt, and using it in a way that we’re not putting as much in the environment.
“Ideally, we want to get to a point where we’re not putting any in,” he said. But it could take time.
“Even if we stop today, it’s going to take a long time. Hundreds of years for the salt to get out of the system that’s already been put into it,” he said.
Meanwhile VDOT is already taking steps to look at the impact of using Salt on the roadway.
VDOT Communications Director Amy Friedenberger said the agency is trying to effectively manage the salt it uses.
“VDOT has partnered with the Department of Environmental Quality and other stakeholders to implement a comprehensive salt management strategy that limits salt from entering surface waters while keeping VDOT’s commitment to maintain public safety during winter weather,” Friedenberger said in a statement. “Examples of these strategic tactics include training of staff, calibration of spreaders and an overall plan for route selection and application rates.”
Road salt is primarily used for de-icing roads during winter to improve safety as it lowers the freezing point of water, preventing ice formation on road surfaces.
But on the flipside, excessive use can lead to environmental issues including soil and water contamination.
Alternatives to road salt include sand and beet juice. The questions remain whether they are as effective as rock salt and road brine.
Snodgrass admits we’re at a tipping point. “If something isn’t done, it could spell an ecological disaster for not only fish and wildlife but for Virginians as well,” he said.
Typically, many localities try to deal with the road use thanks to stormwater control, but even this has done a lot of preventive management.
In a recent study by Snodgrass and his research team, “Environmental Science and Technology,” they discovered that routing runoff contaminated with road salts to stormwater ponds resulted in plumes of highly contaminated groundwater moving from ponds and wildlife.
Current stormwater management practices, according to the study, don’t completely stop chemicals from reaching streams, and the group has seen chemical contamination year-round.
“People may end up drinking watering containing sodium levels that exceed those recommended for people on low sodium diets,” Snodgrass said.
“Municipal water supplies may also become contaminated and require treatment to lower sodium and chloride levels before distribution.”
He also states that we’re basically putting animals in a desert, because they can’t regulate the salt in their bodies and get enough water to balance it out.
“If salt levels continue to increase in freshwater areas, many fish and amphibians will stop breeding and eventually die because their bodies cannot adjust to the changes,” he said.
This is where the new study being ordered by the General Assembly bill will examine rock salt’s replacement.
Options being tried around the country include the beet juice mixture, calcium, magnesium chloride and even cat litter.
Experts have said they are tradeoffs with each of those.
The most unusual one might be beet juice, which is mixed 20-80 with salt brine to create a de-icer for roads working in temperatures as low as minus-25 Fahrenheit. The mixture is a sugary, sticky product. The positive includes the fact it can stay on the road longer, up to four days, and is less corrosive than salt, reducing damage to vehicles and concrete.
The beet product is labeled as GeorMelt.
Magnesium chloride is a high-performance de-icer with the ability to melt ice at lower temperatures and with less environmental impact than traditional rock salt. VDOT often uses this product as high-performance additive during inclement weather.
MC works effectively at temperatures as low as minus-15 Fahrenheit. As a hygroscopic salt, it absorbs moisture from the air to create a brine immediately, thus accelerating the melting process. It is also much gentler on concrete and contains much lower amounts of chloride, making it less toxic to surrounding vegetation and safer for “pet paws.”
MC typically leaves little or no residue, though over applications can sometimes leave a “greasy film.”
Another possibility is “pickle juice,” an eco-friendly and cost effective in comparison to rock salt. Typically, this is often a mixture courtesy of waste byproduct via food production, and costing as little as seven cents per gallon.
The future use of pickle juice and some of the alternatives will mean investment in much-different equipment, such as tanker trucks with spray nozzles versus the current standard spreaders.
Most residents have heard the use of the word “brine,” which typically a mixture of water and salt, sprayed onto surfaces before winter storms to prevent ice from bonding to the pavement. It is used proactively 24 to 48 hours before a storm to prevent, rather than melt, heavy ice buildups.
While brine improves safety by reducing ice, it has shown to cause rust on vehicles and if it rains before the snowstorm, the brine might wash away.
VDOT has until Nov.15, 2026, to submit its findings to the chairs of the House and Senate Committees on Transportation.
