Back-Melting of a Horizontal Cloudy Ice Layer with Radiative Heating

This paper is concerned with the melting of a horizontal ice layer sticking to a substrate by using halogen lamps, which are comparatively short wave radiation sources. This radiation in the visible and infrared spectral range may be employed to remove ice from structures subject to atmospheric icing. It is concluded that the behavior of radiation transfer in a cloudy ice layer depends a great deal on the density of the cloudy ice including air bubbles which produce the scattering of radiation. Also the phenomenon of back-melting caused by radiant energy penetrating through the ice layer is observed. Moreover, it is shown that the melting rate of an ice layer can be predicted numerically by using the band model of extinction coefficient for cloudy ice assumed in this study.