Buffalo Snow Melters

Snow Piles?

Plowing and piling snow may seem like the easiest and cheapest way of solving a snow handling problem, but it's not. the indirect costs are the real problem.

Snow piles can reduce a parking area by 25% or more. Just compare the loss of income to store owners who rely on those parking spaces for income over the winter months.

A less obvious, but possibly more damaging cost is the spring repair to a parking lot surface. A partially frozen pile of snow can exert hundreds of pounds of pressure per square foot. This pressure results in the compaction of the fill under the blacktop creating cracks, dents and potholes. It is possible to do tens of thousands of dollars damage to a larger lot in just one winter.

So just truck it away ...

It is true that trucking snow can solve the problem of lot space and damage, but at what cost?

Trucking is not cheap. To truck snow away, trucks, high lift loaders, plows, personnel, coordination, dumping locations and dumping permits are needed.

So what is the solution?

The Buffalo Snow Melter allows a plow operator to start the unit, and plow directly into it. The snow is then melted and will run down the storm sewer where it would end up anyway at the first spring thaw. Depending on the size of the lot, and inches of snow, it is possible to amortize a Buffalo Snow Melter in just a couple of winters.