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Road Makers Turn To Recycled Plastic For Tougher Surfaces (economist.com)
Recycled plastic is already used to make some products, such as guttering and sewage pipes. Now attention is turning to roads. From a report: On September 11th in Zwolle, a town in the Netherlands, a 30-metre bicycle track made from 70% recycled plastic and the rest from polypropylene was opened [Warning: the link may be paywalled; alternative source]. It will be used to test a product called PlasticRoad, which is being developed by two Dutch firms -- KWS, a road builder, and Wavin, a firm that makes plastic piping -- in partnership with Total, a French oil-and-gas firm. PlasticRoad is prefabricated in a factory as modular sections. The sections are then transported to the site and laid end to end on a suitable foundation, such as sand. Because these sections are hollow, internal channels can be incorporated into them for drainage, along with conduits for services such as gas and electricity. For the Zwolle project, sections that were 2.4 metres long and 3 metres wide were used. These were fitted with sensors to measure things such as temperature, flexing and the flow of water through the drainage channels. A second pilot cycleway is being built in the nearby town of Giethoorn.
If all goes well, the inventors hope to develop the idea and make the sections entirely from recycled plastic. Paths, car parks and railway platforms could follow. Eventually, sections for use as actual roads are planned. These could contain sensors for traffic monitoring. In time, the circuits in the plastic roads might extend to assisting autonomous vehicles and recharging electric cars wirelessly. Prefabricated plastic roads should last two-to-three times longer than conventional roads and cost less, the companies claim, mainly because construction times would be reduced by almost two-thirds. Anti-slip surfaces could be incorporated, too, including crushed stones which are traditionally used to dress road surfaces. The sections, when replaced, can also be recycled. But engineers will be watching to see how the track stands up to wear and tear and if the hollow structure causes resonance, which would make such a road unduly noisy.
If all goes well, the inventors hope to develop the idea and make the sections entirely from recycled plastic. Paths, car parks and railway platforms could follow. Eventually, sections for use as actual roads are planned. These could contain sensors for traffic monitoring. In time, the circuits in the plastic roads might extend to assisting autonomous vehicles and recharging electric cars wirelessly. Prefabricated plastic roads should last two-to-three times longer than conventional roads and cost less, the companies claim, mainly because construction times would be reduced by almost two-thirds. Anti-slip surfaces could be incorporated, too, including crushed stones which are traditionally used to dress road surfaces. The sections, when replaced, can also be recycled. But engineers will be watching to see how the track stands up to wear and tear and if the hollow structure causes resonance, which would make such a road unduly noisy.
Which is nothing but an oil product.
A lot of the volume of blacktop is gravel and sand. Which, when worn down becomes sand. When that gets into water ways, it just settles to the bottom with the other sand. The tar and other heavy petrochemical products do enter the environment, but at a pretty slow rate where they are broken down by biological activity*.
*We had a city park near me that was found to be an old (WWII era) fuel tank farm. With plumes of fuel soaking into the soil. The solution was to remove the sod, till up the dirt underneath and mix it with some specialized bacteria strains and let it sit for about a year. After that, all the petroleum waste was gone and it's now a park again.
Have gnu, will travel.
For those who can't see past the paywall, there are some pretty good images of the road sections here.
Check your premises.
Um, no. Just no.
You're talking about non-paved surfaces. This is about paved surfaces.
On paved surfaces, the data says that adding rubber/plastic recycled materials improves durability. Overweight trucks and plenty of them, will still erode them. High traffic volume, wide ambient environment, poor road beds, all will do their share to screw up paved surfaces. Bikes, by their nature, do not present the weight and lateral surface impact that heavy trucks present.
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