Snow Rock Salt. Let It Snow Once I’Ve Got My Rock Salt
With wintry weather on it’s way, make sure you have a bag or 2 of Rock Salt to hand to keep your paths and driveways snow and ice free.
Here’s some information about this great British product.
Rock salt is composed of the mineral halite otherwise know as sodium chloride and occurs in thick beds, deep beneath parts of Cheshire, Yorkshire and Northern Ireland. It is predominantly used for road de-icing.
It is mined in the UK at Winsford in Cheshire, Boulby in North Yorkshire and Carrickfergus in Northern Ireland. In this country rock salt never occurs at the surface because the rainwater which soaks into the ground always dissolves it away.
The salt formed 200–300 million years ago, when much of Britain was covered by a shallow sea surrounded by hot dry desert lands — much like the Persian Gulf today. As the water from this sea evaporated, salt crystals formed from the brine (salty water), along with other useful minerals.
Traditional mining methods are used for mining rock salt and the mines vary in depth from 100 metres to a mile or more. There are networks of pathways within the mines which are used as roads for mining vehicles to move from one part of the mine to another.
A machine similar to the pneumatic drill is used on the working face of the mine. It has a rotating head, carrying tungsten-carbide tips, which bores into the salt. The lumps are taken to the crushing and screening plant.
Once crushed, the rock salt is treated with an anti-caking agent which will stop the pieces coagulating. This means rock salt can be stock piled in readiness for the bad weather.
The UK has large resources of rock salt in the ground that is sufficient to last hundreds of years.
Suffice to say you can purchase your rock salt from us in handy 25kg bags in preparation for the big freeze. http://www.londongases.co.uk/view/rock-salt-25kg-bag
Let it snow, Let it snow, Let it snow!!