Assessing the impact of pavement de-icing products on aircraft and airfield infrastructure

Abstract

In the mid-1990s, airports worldwide started to introduce new types of alkali-metal-salt based pavement de-icing products (PDPs) to mitigate the environmental concerns of the previously used urea and glycol-based PDPs. While improvements to the operational and environmental quality of airport winter maintenance activities were seen, a significant number of field reports started to surface regarding the unintended consequences of these new PDPs, including the catalytic oxidation of carbon-carbon brakes, cadmium corrosion, PDP interaction with aircraft de-icing and anti-icing fluids, asphalt and concrete deterioration, and the corrosion to airfield electrical infrastructure and ground support equipment. The Airport Cooperative Research Program therefore began research to collect data on PDP usage and review the damage associated with these new PDPs. This paper summarises that research effort.