Magnesium chloride is used in three ways for pavement ice control: Anti-icing, when maintenance professionals spread it onto roads before a snow storm to prevent snow from sticking and ice from forming; prewetting, which means a liquid formulation of magnesium chloride is sprayed directly onto salt as it is being spread onto roadway pavement, wetting the salt so that it sticks to the road; and pretreating, when magnesium chloride and salt are mixed together before they are loaded onto trucks and spread onto paved roads.