COMPARISON OF DRY GRANULATION AND WET AGGLOMERATION OF SNOW

In sufficiently developed wet snow avalanches, the snow sometimes changes into rounded lumps like snowballs. This process is called dry granulation. On the other hand, when large-scale slush flows occur, the snow sometimes changes into rounded lumps like snowballs immersed in water. This process is called wet agglomeration. To investigate the difference between the two processes, small tests were performed by the tumbling granulation method using the same new snow. The particle size distribution of snowballs in dry granulation was wider than that in wet agglomeration. The mean particle diameter of snowballs in wet agglomeration was larger than that in dry granulation. In addition, the number of granulated snowballs in dry granulation was equal to approximately the square of that in wet agglomeration.