Training Offered on Smart Salting Practices

Smart salting practices can reduce salt use, save money, and protect waterways while maintaining safe paved surfaces.

Lake Champlain Sea Grant and University of Vermont (UVM) Extension are offering a free training for private contractors, municipal employees, property managers, and others who maintain parking lots and sidewalks in winter. It will be held online on October 25 from 8:00am to 1:00pm.  

Winter Maintenance Training for Parking Lots and Sidewalks is based on the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA)'s smart salting courses. Participation is limited to 50 individuals with preference given to those residing within the Lake Champlain basin.  

To register go to https://go.uvm.edu/smart-salt-course. To request a disability-related accommodation, contact Kris Stepenuck at kstepenu [at] uvm.edu or (802) 868-1048 by October 8.

The course is designed to help participants make cost-effective, environmentally conscious choices for winter parking lot and sidewalk management. Among the topics to be covered are winter maintenance basics, the melting characteristics and other properties of various deicers, proper storage of road salt and salt/sand piles, calculating parking lot or sidewalk areas, calibration of salt spreading equipment, calculating application rates, and tips for application. 

Participants who successfully complete the written exam will be listed on the MPCA website with the option to also be listed on the Lake Champlain Sea Grant website as having successfully completed the course. This list of practitioners knowledgeable about sustainable salting practices will be available for anyone in the Lake Champlain basin interested in hiring someone to maintain their parking lots and sidewalks during winter.