Down the slippery slope

December 7, 2007 1:43 PM

How do I go about making sure that some relatively steep outdoor stairs going from the street up the hill to our future house stay ice-free over the long Austrian winter? I don't want to use de-icing chemicals (or salt) and I would prefer a solution as 'green' as possible.

I googled and found some electrical mats that can be placed on the stairs but I would like a solution that is built into the concrete steps. Something like heated water pipes going up and down the stairs (I saw a similar thing in Ushuaia but for horizontal surfaces). Does anyone have experience and / or some internet pointers for something like this? How efficient would the pipes be? Is there an option more environment-friendly?

posted by Parsnip to Technology (22 answers total)

I think that the most environmentally friendly way of doing this is to clear snow of the steps as soon as possible after it falls and, if required, use a little elbow grease to remove ice if it builds up (e.g. from freezing rain). Heating the steps in order to melt ice is not very environmentally friendly because of the energy used.
posted by ssg at 1:48 PM on December 7, 2007

Make the concrete as black as possible, preferably with something that cannot be worn away -- like an additive to the concrete mix, not a paint. Then make it possible for water to drain off the steps easily; cut grooves in the surface (this will improve traction as well).

If you try the pipes, don't use water -- use antifreeze fluid. You could try to improve the system by using a solar heater for the fluid, and a solar-powered impeller to move it. However, this would ruin nighttime performance and the freezing at night might be too much for the system to "catch up" so it may never really work very well.

Alternatively, ditch the concrete and use grip-tread industrial galvanized steel stairs. Elevate them a bit off the ground so the ice/water can flow through the grid. Most snow will fall through the grid, and most ice will flow off as well. You can get some extremely aggressive traction patterns on stairs -- very spikey.
posted by aramaic at 1:53 PM on December 7, 2007

There's a salt alternative; I think it's calcium chloride. My city makes salted sand available. The sand provides grit; the salt promotes melting. Used judiciously, it's effective and low-impact. Clearing the snow is definitely key. Sand alone is great for traction.
posted by theora55 at 1:53 PM on December 7, 2007

Response by poster: SSG - I agree with you. From an environment POV that would be the best solution. Here is, though, a scenario: we have small children (or, later, we're old and frail), we wake up in the morning and the steps are full of ice. There are about 50 of them and quite steep. It's a serious hazard. I am not lazy, I just need a backup to elbow grease.
posted by Parsnip at 1:54 PM on December 7, 2007

I neglected to mention: a drawback of the steel grip-pattern approach is that you'll always have to wear shoes on the stairs, unless you have very tough feet or a fairly mild traction pattern.

(maybe I'm just wimpy, but dang those stairs can hurt!)
posted by aramaic at 1:54 PM on December 7, 2007

Would it be possible to cover or enclose the stairs somehow?

(I know that your stairs are different from these, but that's sort of what I am thinking)
posted by davey_darling at 1:58 PM on December 7, 2007

Response by poster: Aramaic - thanks for your idea. The steel stairs would actually work but Ms. Parsnip won't have them. Says they're ugly. I would tend to agree.

Theora - Calcium chloride is available in Austria as well. We're told it's better not to use it if you have pets (dogs, especially). For that reason we would prefer to avoid any chemicals.
posted by Parsnip at 2:01 PM on December 7, 2007

The only way to do it is to build a roof over it. Make it a covered walkway.
posted by Steven C. Den Beste at 2:04 PM on December 7, 2007

Ms. Parsnip won't have them. Says they're ugly

Due to the color, or their shape/design? Color is fixable; industrial paints are pretty durable and then you'd avoid the silvery look.

Could try the same steel concept, only with thin wood slats on top of the steel (steel provides the structural integrity, wood provides the aesthetics). I've seen that done in a park once. You'd have to be careful what kind of wood you used, however, or the slats would go all wavy. Ipe, perhaps?
posted by aramaic at 2:07 PM on December 7, 2007

Arg, dangit, hit Post instead of Preview -- when I said "slat" above, I meant something like a 2cm by 2cm stick, each stick being 1-0.5cm from the next. That way snow & ice can flow through. Maybe drive button-head nails into the slats at regular intervals for extra traction.
posted by aramaic at 2:09 PM on December 7, 2007

sand or kitty litter greatly reduces the slippery effect if you can't shovel before it melts a bit. As far as the steel stair idea goes, they are not worth the ugly factor, had some back in MT (fairly spikey/traction ones) and they still were very slippery if not cleared off right away
posted by estronaut at 2:21 PM on December 7, 2007

An electric heating mat is not a green alternative. Use sand if you can't clear all the snow/ice with shovels and brooms. Cinders used to be the preferred solution but these days it is probably difficult to find good cinders. You can make sure there is an adequate railing in place on both sides of the steps to grip while ascending or descending. Ensuring that there is adequate off step drainage for melted snow will prevent ice from building up during thaws.

The best alternative is not to worry about the ice on the steps and get something like this for everyone in the family.
posted by JJ86 at 2:25 PM on December 7, 2007

If you just want it as a backup for those times when you can't shovel it for whatever reason (and you don't want to cover the steps, or use something that the snow will not be able to build up on like steel grid steps), I think the environmental impact of using salt would be a lot less than the environmental impact of buying, installing, maintaining and using some kind of embedded snow-melting system. If it were me though, I'd cover the steps.
posted by ssg at 2:28 PM on December 7, 2007

OK, I admit to not attending the church of environmentalism so could somebody 'splain to me how salt is not 'green'? It's a pretty basic substance found all over the world. I would guess it requires much less processing than kitty litter or some other evil chemical substitute.

Does it result in pre-salted chicken eggs if it gets into the water supply? (Yes, that's a joke)

Don't want to hijack the thread but I'm hoping for a serious explanation.
posted by trinity8-director at 2:32 PM on December 7, 2007

Salt is not green because too much use in areas where it is not naturally occurring can do damage to the watershed. Remember reading those stories in elementary school about how the Romans used to salt the earth of their enemies? It wasn't just to give them more condiments for their soups.
posted by JJ86 at 2:35 PM on December 7, 2007

How cold does it get? If it's within 2 or 3 degrees of freezing, perhaps you could use water from a soaker hose.
posted by KokuRyu at 2:38 PM on December 7, 2007

As long as the water has somewhere to drain, a hose supplying hot water would be perfect for this. It's my favourite method of removing ice, and I've tried them all.
posted by sfenders at 3:28 PM on December 7, 2007

Yes... a cold winter's morning, and you wake up to a hot bath first thing in the morning. The water, though, drains into your specially-constructed graywater system; you dry off and dress quickly, then open the valve to the "stair drain". Since the water is still hot, it melts the ice and snow as it drains. Your bath alone clears the top few steps; the bath of wife gets the rest. You go and double check the lowest steps; if they're not quite clear, you pour out some gravel, cat litter, or maybe even some salt (the rock garden around there doesn't mind the occasional salt quite so much as another type).

Of course, there are serious flaws with this idea -- the water would have to collect _somewhere_, and it would freeze there. Might be OK if there's a drain nearby.

And it would be tricky to engineer the initial course of the water so that it would evenly warm the stairs. And if the water wasn't hot enough, it would just make the stairs more slickly icy.
posted by amtho at 3:42 PM on December 7, 2007

If the stair way can be made to face South, you'll get quicker solar help. I'm not clear on whether your "future " house and stairway exist now, or you are planning for a "future" house/stairway.
posted by Agamenticus at 3:50 PM on December 7, 2007

Heated water pipes could be done in conjunction with a geothermal heat exchange system, reducing the environmental impact. As a bonus, if you were investing in that, you could choose a system with high enough volume to heat your house (and cool it in summer).
posted by katemonster at 4:03 PM on December 7, 2007

The covered walkway really is the greenest option.
posted by flabdablet at 4:25 AM on December 8, 2007

If you can't do a covered walkway, I would think fairly high walls on both sides of the stairs would help prevent drifting snow and ice, and limit the crap from high above.
posted by unrepentanthippie at 3:11 PM on December 9, 2007