iN VIDEO: Kamloops landscaping company is melting away winter

KAMLOOPS – With all the snow over the last few days, snow removal services have been busy plowing, salting and hauling away snow. But one Kamloops company is taking a different approach by melting the snow, not hauling it way.

Lyons Landscaping is one of the first B.C. companies to use a CT-15 Trecan Snowmelter, according to general manager Collin Lyons. His company began researching different alternatives to remove snow from busy parking lots while also reducing traffic and being more cost effective.

The company uses a snowmelter and currently has two clients, B.C. Hydro and Royal Inland Hospital, where the snow is melted from the busy parking lots. But the snowmelter is also used at other sites whenever it's needed.

Lyons adds that one snowmelter replaces several dump trucks that would be on the property removing snow.

"We can melt as much as six dump trucks can haul in an hour," Lyons says. "It's less wear and tear on the property and we are not congesting them any further."

Lyons says after the snow is dumped into the tank, it only takes seconds for it to melt.

So, how does a snowmelter exactly work?

The snowmelter is a mobile unit on a trailer attached to a truck. Snow is dumped into a tank filled with water, where water is drawn through a heated cylinder and sprays warm water to melt the snow, and then goes into an overflow drain and into a storm drain after it passes through a filter which blocks large pieces of debris.

Lyons says during this process, sand can be pulled from the unit and recycled for future sanding purposes.  

The landscaping company has received approval from the City of Kamloops to let the water from the melted snow go into the storm drains.

Other than reducing the number of emissions and fuel used by trucks hauling away snow, Lyons says the snowmelter also eliminates a snow dumpsite cleanup that usually follows in the spring.

"We knew some dumpsites were going to become an issue," he says. "This way we don't have to haul it away." 

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