“Plastic
offers all kinds of advantages compared to current road construction, both in
laying the roads and maintenance.”
Rolf Mars, the director
of VolkerWessels’ roads subdivision, KWS Infra, commenting on the plan to use
plastic to pave roads in Rotterdam, Netherlands
Jamaicans
struggling with plastic blocking our drains, take note!!!
The
Netherlands could become the first country to pave its streets with plastic
bottles.
This
after the Rotterdam city council decided to use plastic as a greener
alternative to asphalt as reported in the article “Netherlands
to Build Roads With Recycled Plastic From the Ocean”,
published Oct 21, 2017 by Joao Freita, Good News Network.
They're actually going forward with this crazy idea; a road made entirely from recycled plastic. Back then, Jaap Peters, from the city council’s engineering bureau, was upbeat on this idea on paper, quote: “We’re very positive towards the developments around PlasticRoad. Rotterdam is a city that is open to experiments and innovative adaptations in practice. We have a ‘street lab’ available where innovations like this can be tested.”
So
what are the advantages of using plastic instead of asphalt to pave roads?
VolkerWessels and
Plastic Roads – Putting Plastic Waste to good use
The
construction firm VolkerWessels had unveiled plans on Friday July 10th 2015 as
noted in the article “Crazy
paving: Rotterdam to consider trialling plastic roads”,
published Friday 10 July 2015 15.36 BST, The UK Guardian.
They plan to collect plastic from the ocean and recycle it to make the plastic roads. Not only will this gradually clean up all the plastic form the ocean, but it will also set a trend for the recycling of plastic to make other things.
For
one, it requires less maintenance than
asphalt and can withstand greater extremes of temperature– between -40º to 176º
Fahrenheit (-40º to 80ºC).. it can also be laid in a matter of weeks instead of
months as lighter materials can also be transported more easily and efficiently
as well.
Sections
of the roads can prefabricated in a factory and transported, reducing on-site
construction. This translates to shorter construction time and low maintenance
and hence less congestion caused by roadworks.
Asphalt is responsible for 1.6m tons of CO2 emissions a year globally –
2% of all road transport emissions, so using plastic is good for the environment
overall.
Plastic roads are lighter, reducing the load on the ground. They can also be made to be hollow, easier to install cables and utility pipelines below the surface without having to worry about them. Cutting through plastic roads to make changes would require either a laser cutter, making them easier to repair, albeit that would be unlikely, given the durability and long life of plastic.
Studies
suggest that nearly any type of plastic can be used. Scientists are already in
the final stages of testing the safety of the material, with the first roads
will be built later in 2017. Truly, this is god news for the plant that
everyone can emulate!!!
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