Sibley County, MN Roof Snow Load - 35 psf
Sibley County, MN roof snow load, translated
A typical heated home in Sibley County is designed to carry 35 pounds per square foot of snow on its roof, per ASCE 7-22.
On a roof that means 77 in. of fresh snow, 28 in. once it packs down, or 7 in. of solid ice - three very different piles for the same load. A load this size is a serious structural matter; pre-modern-code homes and low-slope or flat-roofed sections are the ones most worth an inspection.
Snow on Sibley County's roofs right now?
Sibley County in numbers
- Design roof snow load35 psf
- Ground snow load, ASCE 7 map50 psf
- National rank#165 of 2,758
- Minnesota rank#65 of 87
- Population15,194
- Annual snowfall, NOAA normal50 in.
- FIPS27143
Where Sibley County ranks
#65 of 87 Minnesota counties by design load, top 6% of 2,758 nationally - that's Sibley County's spot. That's 2.4 psf below Minnesota's own county-average design load of 37.4 psf.
FIPS 27143, population 15,194, centered near 44.5757°N 94.2301°W. ASCE 7's underlying ground snow load here is 50 psf before the code's exposure and importance factors bring it to the 35 psf design figure above.
Sibley County: average annual snowfall
Sibley County sees about 50 in. of snow most winters, per the BROWNTON WWTP, MN US station's 1991-2020 NOAA normal. See the density guide.
Read this before you use Sibley County's figure
The figure above assumes the case ASCE 7-22 treats as typical: a heated, ordinary-occupancy home on a partially exposed site. Change any of those - exposure, heating, roof pitch, occupancy category - and the real design number moves.
A building permit needs the number at your exact address, not the county average - the free ASCE 7 Hazard Tool returns that from your coordinates in about a minute and produces a PDF a plan reviewer will accept. See the methodology guide.