Energy consumption and utilization rate analysis of automatically snow-melting system in infrastructures by thermal simulation and melting experiments

The automatically snow-melting system with the electric heating pipes (AS-EHP) is applied in infrastructures (concrete pavement, parking apron, garage entrances and municipal road) in cold regions to mitigate the accumulated snow problem. In order to reduce the energy consumption (EC) and improve the energy utilization rate (EUR) of AS-EHP, the analysis about EC and EUR is investigated. The melting process of AS-EHP is divided into two phases which include preheating the infrastructures and melting. The influence and sensitivity analysis between the inputs (the pipes' embedded spacing and embedded depth, heating power and wind velocity) and the outputs (EC and EUR) are found and compared in two phases by thermal simulation. The applicability and rationality of the simulation are verified by snow melting experiments. According to the simulation, decreasing embedded spacing and depth in phase 1 and phase 2 could reduce EC and improve EUR. In the two phases, the heating power is suggested to be 100 W/m-140 W/m under the condition that the heating pipe' embedded spacing is 0.10 m-0.25 m, the depth is 0.06 m-0.12 m, and the wind velocity is 0 m/s-15 m/s. The results and suggestions could be used to efficiently guide the scheme design and operation control of AS-EHP in infrastructures.