Abstract
The presence of road ice has always been a key issue during winter months. A reliable forecast system capable of predicting the Land Surface Temperature (LST) and, consequently, its formation is one of the best strategies to operate towards reducing both vehicles accidents and waste of chemical solvents used for prevention which have a significant economic and environmental impact. Hence, the Meteo Expert Centre (MEC) has developed an algorithm for LST forecasts able to issue ice risk warnings as well. This algorithm operationally works every day in real-time and it is here tested, first, on a paved area of the Pedemontana Lombarda motorway and the Milano Linate airport airstrip, and, afterwards, since the LST plays a crucial role in understanding phenomena of energy exchange between soil, vegetation, and atmosphere, its knowledge and prediction becomes relevant also for other purposes such as agricultural management and irrigation system control, further experiments are carried out over two agricultural fields, one in the North and the other in the South of Italy during the SIM (Smart Irrigation Management) project. All LST analyses showed encouraging results with reasonable high values of statistical scores, in both applications on asphalted and different vegetated terrains, demonstrating that the developed algorithm has a high versatility even on completely different types of surfaces, and it can be applied as a valid tool for road ice risk warnings too.
Highlights
The presence of ice on roads has always been a key factor during the cold season: first, it is one of the main causes of road accidents [1,2,3], it has huge environmental and economic impacts due to counteract measures adopted in order to reduce its hazard [4]
We proposed a study of an algorithm developed by the Meteo Expert Centre (MEC)
The obtained results are discussed in two sections: the first detailing the performance of the algorithm which forecasts the Land Surface Temperature (LST) and the second analyzing the probability of ice risk—the latter for the Pedemontana and Linate case-studies only
Summary
The presence of ice on roads has always been a key factor during the cold season: first, it is one of the main causes of road accidents [1,2,3], it has huge environmental and economic impacts due to counteract measures adopted in order to reduce its hazard [4]. To face and reduce these risks on roads, the main precautionary measure is salt spreading, which is harmful for the environment [5], but it constitutes one of the highest expenses for public administrations both for the cost of chemical solvents and for its highly corrosive properties which, subsequently, require road restorations and interventions. Its dissolution in water courses may produce changes in the ecosystems and it can be toxic to fishes; nitrogen and soluble phosphate favor the algae bloom and weed aquatic vegetation
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