Maryland transportation crews using less salt, more brine on icy roads to protect waterways

The Norman Transcript

By Lilly Price, The Baltimore Sun (TNS)

January 29, 2022

BALTIMORE — With the approaching snowstorm predicted to dust the Baltimore area and blanket the Eastern Shore while creating dangerous conditions into Saturday morning, state highway crews and local transportation departments spent Friday preparing the roads.

Crews treating state highways and county roads were expected to scatter less rock salt and spray more brine solution to melt ice on roads before and during the weekend snowfall, a measure aimed at reducing the amount of sodium chloride that runs off highways and contaminates soil and groundwater.

“Our federal and state commitments to clean water ensure that we track different sources of pollution and types of pollution, and increasingly the evidence is clear that road salt and other de-icing chemicals can threaten the quality of our streams, rivers and lakes, and drinking water supplies above-ground and underground,” said Ben Grumbles, the Maryland secretary of the environment.

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