If you’re looking for systems for heating your driveways, sidewalks, ramps, and other parts in front of your house, you’ve come to the right place to get top-notch information on heated driveway systems. Without further ado, let’s get straight to the point!
There is a bunch of material available for heated driveway systems, such as snow melting mats and cables, which are both known as heating elements or some additional tools. But let’s first look at these systems and how they work.
What are driveway heating systems?
We all want to get out of the house without getting into trouble in the mornings of a cold winter day and try to get the car out of the garage while the concrete and asphalt driveways in front of it aren’t snowy and icy, but the question is: “How can we achieve that?”
Well, the age of de-icing and shoveling has already ended, and we can simply achieve this by using some modern, cool systems called snow-melting systems.
These ice-melting systems have some benefits, and we want to discuss them in the following parts but before that, let’s glance at the different ways you can heat your driveways.
What are the different methods for heating concrete and asphalt driveways?
You can have electrical or water-based systems for driveway heating purposes, and both of these radiant floor heating systems are completely versatile, but there are some subtle differences that you are going to find in this part:
- The first one is Electrical snow-melting systems. They are made up of heating cables and mats, and these mats can be rolled out whenever you want. You can use them again by putting these metal rods underneath your pavements, driveways, etc. You can also control their heating system, like how much the temperature should be, it’s timing, and also its duration.
- On the other hand, we have Hydronic heated driveway systems. They are installed by putting a closed-loop system under the driveway. You can warm the water with a boiler, also known as a water heater.
We highly recommend you learn more about different types of driveway snow melting systems used in Toronto.
Although each of these radiant heating systems has its pros and cons, we will delve into them for heated driveway systems in the next part.
Pros and Cons of Heated Driveway Systems:
Now let’s take a look at the pros and cons of concrete and asphalt heated driveway systems.
Pros of Heated Driveway Systems
- You don’t need to physically go outside and deal with the snow on your driveways by shoveling, as mentioned above. Simply turn the system on, and it will do the job for you. Bingo!
- It won’t do any harm to your vehicles and place. You can simply get rid of ice and snow without ruining your plants, concrete, and so on.
- You might also reduce the stress of thinking about what will happen to your family, friends, or even pedestrians when walking across your house. They might slip, or even worse, They might file a complaint against you if that happens to a visitor and they get injured. So, let’s bring peace to your mind!
- Sub-zero temps can destroy your asphalts, and they will last shorter if we don’t make them warm in the long term. Using these systems through hot water or even natural gas in the hydronic method, you can protect and maintain your driveways.
- But we have yet to talk about the most mouth-watering part. A sweet five-letter word called “money”. Saving money is another important factor for everyone. When it comes to paying money, everyone loves spending less and getting the highest quality, and that’s exactly what these radiant heating systems can do for you. Enjoy saving your budget by using these systems. How about spending $25-75 per hour to have a clearing system for your driveways? NO!!! You don’t need to waste your money anymore. Thanks to radiant driveway heating systems.
Cons of Driveway Heating Systems
- The installation process of electrical and hydronic radiant floors and concrete pouring over the driveways is usually a time-consuming and difficult due to removing the old driveway and implementing the new one. Sometimes we need a contractor to do the installation for us, and they get help from an approach called resurfacing.
- Although using heated driveway systems might be a cool idea in our generation, we also need to deal with utility bills and high payments. This information is about the resident’s usage of your gas, electricity, or water service. It does make sense to pay more when you use more gas resources for heating your driveways in the end. So, it highly depends on your area to weigh up your options on the table, and one of them is checking if utility bills are already high in your city.
- Although its installation is time-consuming, it’s money-consuming as well, and it needs a professional to get the job done for you. The costs depend on the square foot, the possibility of snowfall in that area, and some other criteria. It starts from $3000-$5000 to $13,000-$16,000, depending on its size.
- Repairing it is also risky because, if needed, you must tear out part or all of the driveway. Therefore, make sure to get a warranty.
Conclusion
You came this long also to figure out if it’s worth spending such an amount of money and the answer is a short “Yes”! It does. Comparing the pros and cons only confirms this and nothing more.
If you need high-quality driveway snow-melting systems in Toronto, O Plus Plumbing Inc. is always ready to help you create comfortable and safe driveways for your home.