The road maintenance companies in Bavaria produce millions of litres of liquid road salt, year after year. In the near future, some of this will come from cucumber production. Transportation Minister Reichhart presented the project on Friday in Gersthofen near Augsburg.
Normally, the road maintenance companies in Bavaria produce the liquid road salt for winter road clearance themselves. For this purpose, de-icing salt and water are mixed in brine plants. 120 million litres are mixed per season. Of this, in
future 10 million is to be contributed by a large cucumber producer. Transportation Minister Reichhart presented the project on Friday at the Gersthofen autobahn maintenance station.
Cucumber water brine to be spread around Lower Bavarian plant
However, the brine from the cucumber production is not distributed on roads in Swabia, but in Lower Bavaria. This winter, the road maintenance companies around the Dingolfingen plant of the cucumber producer are supplied with the company's salt water for the first time.
State government wants to save 700 tons of road salt
To do this, the salt content of the cucumber water must be doubled to 20 percent. The state government hopes that this method will save around 700 tonnes of road salt per season.
According to the manufacturer, the salt water from cucumber production is normally disposed of in a sewage treatment plant. Now the salt water is treated, cleaned and made available to the winter road clearance service as brine. Tests have shown that the brine can be safely distributed on the roads.
Source: BR24