Thermal analysis of anti-icing on pavements with ground source heat pipes

During the winter months, the soil temperature increases as the soil depth increase, and after a certain depth it does not change. in this study, the prevention of icing on pavements by heat pipes which uses the energy of the ground has been investigated. firstly, the variation of the soil temperature is investigated when the ambient temperature varies between -1 to -7 °c and the wind speed 0 and 3 m/s. for anti-icing, the evaporator, condenser and adiabatic section lengths of the heat pipe to be used were chosen as 3 m, 1 m and 0.1 m respectively and diameters of the heat pipe were determined as 25 mm and 50 mm. the heat pipe material was selected as stainless steel and the working fluid as ammonia. in the study, first it is assumed that the soil temperature is 8 °c at 3 m depth. if the wind speed and outdoor temperature are assumed to be 0 m/s and -1 °c respectively, icing for 1.2 m2 area was prevented by the 25 mm diameter heat pipe. at the same conditions, icing prevented areas by 25 mm and 50 mm heat pipes were calculated as 2 m2 and 2.7 m2 respectively for 3 m depth and with 12 °c soil temperature. heat transfer rate was increased by the increase of the heat pipe diameter and ground source temperature, consequently it was seen that the heat pipe was more effective to prevent icing.