I am building a home this spring that will have a L shape to it and perfectly shade approximately 40 by 20 area that faces due north and will not receive any sun during the winter time. I currently, totally by coincidence happen to live in a rental home that has a similar aspect and shape, though not as big and the snow forming to ice has been big problem for us. Even though I am OCD as I can about getting out quickly as I can and trying to shovel off the area in the shade before someone walks or drives on it, it is apparent that I still cannot seem to keep on top of it enough not to have this problem. As a result I have suffered two bad falls and a friend of mine has had a bad fall as well. I have two major different health issues that really don't need to be further aggravated by such a hard fall on a icy concrete driveway. So as a result of my experience here, I am thinking about potentially designing and installing some type of a "Ice Build Up Prevention" system. Notice I did not say "snow melt". I am very willing to get out and shovel the new snow, but it is the ice and hardened and compacted snow that develops still that I am trying to prevent. My thoughts were if I could simply keep the pad of asphalt or concrete that is going to be in the shade just above the freezing point, then the ice will not develop or at least last very long. I am also even willing to only use it right before a storm comes thru as well if the system would not work well after the snow has fallen and ice has formed. We don't get a monster amount of snow here, only probably an average of maybe 70-80 inches of snow per year is my best guess, minus what blows of the roof that is that can sometimes be significant. The home will be located at 6700 feet in elevation on a gently sloping south facing lot in central Colorado. The thought of trying 3 or 4 SHW panels on the roof has crossed my mind with the plan of using that heat to preheat my hot water tank OR the option of switching over and then slightly heating the "parking/garage/house-entry" pad to prevent the ice formation in this area of 800- 1000 sq. ft. I DO NOT WANT TO use propane for a "proper snow melt system" as that is not my goal nor my desire. I just want to prevent the ice without the use of salt or chemicals that will just get tracked into the house and be a mess. Another potential source of low but constant heat would be a utility line trench that I already will have to dig that will go from the 450 feet from the road to the home. I thought I could deepen that trench in the last 100 or 200 feet and drop down beneath the utility lines and install a closed ground heat source loop in that section and that glycol in the tubing would just continually reticulate thru the trench and into the pad that has a grid of tubing beneath it. While this is not a top priority for me for the home, it is something I would like for a few guys to shoot full of holes before I just simply give up on this because I am not sure if it will work. All the local plumbers or HVAC guys I have talked with just want to sell me a standard snow melt system that will cost a ton to buy and cost a bunch to use. That is not the route I want to go down, especially because of the fact that I don't even have access to natural gas and would have to buy expensive propane and then install an expensive tank as well. Has anyone out there designed and installed a system to address the situation that I am facing without doing a standard gas fired boiler to heat a typical snow melt system? Sorry for the lack of paragraph spacing, for some reason it is not working for me during the edit process......

granted it would be best if the driveway did not have to be in that kind of arangement, I think the SHW idea is best, one other thing you can try , someone brought this up in a conversation about windows, nothing new shining a large mirror for more solar gain into the house, while at the same time could be turned away if proven too much, can't imagine the layout you describe but that would be the simplest if you can swing it, try it on the house you are in now, a large cheap recycled bath mirror should do the trick on a sunny day after the storm, if you shoveled most, wont take much to get it melting, and you can put it away in spring