oldguy
I wish Chris Tuan and his concrete all the best! I hope he makes loads of money and has a happy life! I hope the concrete is very successful! Okay, Im trapped in my house by snow and probably will be for the next few days, so I guess you can see where my heads at.
Observer101
I have a private drive 1/4 mile long, 10 feet wide. I wonder how much electricity it would take to heat it up during the winters?
Stephen N Russell
For whole Midwest & NE SE airports alone & select frwy on/off ramps. Read someplace in FB about snow hitting East that WONT melt even by blowtorch, FYI
bugnuker
I hope they consider what large installations of this stuff may do to customary soil temperatures, as well as energy usage.
vcr
This has to have ADDED CARBON - is this somewhere we can park all that extra carbon we have a problem with or is it only CO2 (cant we split that CO2 to then use the nuisance carbon) ? Next - if they make a do-it-yourself recipe - we will ALL GET OUR DRIVES REFINISHED WITH THIS STUFF - big new industry ready to blossom - then local people can pay for their county to refinish certain areas too !
darkcook
I see the embedded steel particles as a future failure area due to corrosion and visible surface rust blooms. Others have hit on the power consumption figure. I can't imagine how many KW you'd have to pump into those slabs to raise the temps above freezing. Suffice it to say, its a high number.
Daishi
@Observer101 A 1/4 mile heated concrete driveway would cost a fortune. Even ignoring the heating elements you are looking at about $15/square foot.
1320 * 10 * 15 = $198,000
I don't have numbers for what it would take to buy and power a heating element that big but here is a 40 ft one I used for my kitchen floor: http://www.homedepot.com/p/SunTouch-Floor-Warming-40-ft-x-30-in-240V-Radiant-Floor-Warming-Mat-24004030R/100607092
That's about $10/square foot but one to heat a driveway would require way more power than heating a floor that's already in a climate controlled environment. I think it's safe to assume another $15/square foot or more for the heating element meaning you would be spending $400k or more not counting the electricity required to power it.
It might be semi-practical to heat just the end of the driveway where the plow tends to pike snow but in your case just delivering enough power to it over that distance would be a pain.
gizmowiz
Wish I had that on my driveway!
Just Cause
I prefer geothermal heated driveway.
Matt Fletcher
I want to know more. Wonder how much electromagnetic energy it can absorbs naturally from the ground, sun, or atmosphere and also wonder how much is required to melt snow or ice at varying temperatures. As far as supplying electricity to the concrete I can't imagine it's that great of a conductor so this could be significantly more expensive than just plowing but worth looking into.