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Kenneth G. Libbrecht analyzes ice growth and frost heave using thermodynamics. His heat-engine argument bounds the overburden pressure that an advancing freezing front can sustain by comparing useful mechanical work with the maximum efficiency allowed between warm and cold reservoirs.^[ref]

The method separates an equilibrium upper bound from the actual growth rate. A thermodynamically permitted pressure need not be reached if liquid supply or heat removal is too slow. Frost heave therefore cannot be understood solely as the volume expansion of an isolated water sample on freezing.