What happens to all the salt we dump on the roads?

As much of the country endures the heavy snowfall and bitter cold that has marked the start of 2014, municipalities in 26 states will rely on a crucial tool in cleaning their roads: salt. . . But all that salt has to go somewhere. After it dissolves - and is split into sodium and chloride ions - it gets carried away via a runoff and deposited into both surface waters (streams, lakes and rivers) and the groundwater under our feet.