Are Plastic Roads the Future of Pavements?
Alternative pavement materials have been in use for more than five decades as a way to recycle waste and decrease pavement’s bulk material expense. One instance is “glassphalt”, the adding of crushed glass to asphalt binder and aggregate. The addition of glass to asphalt is an efficient method of reducing the usage of recycled or raw crushed rock while utilizing the thousands of tons of crushed glass which is produced annually. As we move further into 2021 an exciting and new engineering option is coming on the scene – plastic roads, and they might be a promising option to America’s roadway health and plastic waste issues.
Plasphalt?
Just as glass may be utilized to substitute aggregate, plastic may be utilized to substitute the asphalt’s bituminous binder. The use of plastic as a binder has 4 main benefits – (1) it’s stronger than conventional binder, (2) the plastic may be of a mixed quality, (3) it’s a direct use of plastic waste, and (4) plastic is efficiently permanently embedded inside the street; which makes it pretty much impossible for plastic to enter water runoff and deteriorate.
Unlike the Solar Roadways which was a groundbreaking idea that failed to efficiently take off, plastic roadways possess a working proof of concept. MacRebur Plastic Roads is a Scotland-based company which has been manufacturing plasticized asphalt since the year 2016 and has been installing it around Australia and the United Kingdom. This binder is designed of a proprietary plastic blend that is directly derived from plastic’s waste products. The binder is stronger than conventional bitumen and cheaper, according to the founder of the company. The usage of plastic inside a designed mix was partially inspired by a more rudimentary technique utilized in India; in which plastic waste products were directly melted into potholes in order to form plugs – similar to amalgam fillings.
As you create a list of all of the professionals you should add to your speed dial, do not forget your paving contractor. Get in touch with Kissner Paving at (706) 956-5296 or email us at [email protected] right away for more details!