Quote:
Originally Posted by upthesaukee
...had a link to another site that explained the insulating characteristics of snow and how it can affect ice formation, and I thought also the melting of ice.
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Look at the last two pages of
this article from NOAA. There's a simple equation that describes what's going on with ice formation. Basically, ice forms whenever there is heat conduction from the lake water to the atmosphere (the ice conducts heat upwards from the warm water underneath to the cold air above). The rate of heat loss (and thus, new ice formation) depends on (a) the temperature difference between the lake (Tf) and the top of the ice (Ts), and (b) the thickness (H) of the ice.
Heat Loss is proportional to (Tf - Ts)/H, where Tf > 32 degrees
Two things to note, here:
(1) If the surface temperature is high enough, heat from the surface flows down to the lake, warming the lake water
(2) Since snow is an insulator, it not only slows down the formation of the ice, but it also retards the ice melt.