Bags, bottles being transformed into roadways

Melbourne, Australia — The future may be paved with recycled plastics.

At least three projects around the world — in Australia, New Zealand and the Netherlands — are putting down pavement made using recycled plastics in place of virgin asphalt.

In Australia, Downer EDI Ltd. has used soft plastics such as bags along with the toner from used printer cartridges, glass and recycled asphalt in a 1,400-foot section of roadway in a Melbourne suburb.

In New Zealand, Fulton Hogan paved part of Christchurch International Airport's fire station with an asphalt mix that includes, 3,100 4-liter plastic oil containers.

And the Dutch community of Zwolle, the PlasticRoad project will begin by using recycled plastics for two pilot projects made up of 30-meter long bicycle paths made of hollow prefabricated elements enabling water drainage and laying down of cables and pipes.

The PlasticRoad concept was launched in 2015 by market leader in road construction KWS, a subsidiary of Royal VolkerWessels. The specific locations have not been named yet.

In Australia, the suburban roadway in Craigieburn uses 200,000 plastic bags and other soft plastic packaging; 63,000 glass bottles; toner from more than 4,500 used printer cartridges; and 50 metric tons of recycled asphalt to create 250 metric tons to create what Downer EDI is currently calling "Plastiphalt."

Dante Cremasco, Downer's executive general manager for its Melbourne-based road services division, told Plastics News the company has applied for a trademark for Plastiphalt, but may need to vary the name if it exists elsewhere.

Downer scientists have been working on its product for "several years" to get the optimum mix of recyclables, but the National Sword program in China, which cut off many waste plastic imports, accelerated the process because it means more waste plastic is being stockpiled in Australia and recycling costs have increased.

Downer has partnered with two resource recovery and recycling companies, Melbourne-based international entity Close the Loop Pty. Ltd., which provides the recycled toner cartridges; and Melbourne-based REDcycle Pty. Ltd., which collects post-consumer soft plastic, unsuitable for council-operated curbside recycling programs, via collection points located outside Australia's major supermarket chains' stores.

Cremasco said Close the Loop approached Downer "some years ago" about recycling toner from used cartridges and Downer initially developed road-building products Tonerpave and Tonerseal, which include toner polymers, and "99 percent asphalt," which has only 1 percent virgin material, using toner, old tires, glass and other recycled resources.

Those products have been in use for low traffic volume roads for about five years, Cremasco said.

Close the Loop said recycled toner from printer cartridges is well suited to asphalt because toner powder predominantly consists of small particles of high-grade engineering plastics. The same plastics are commonly used to modify bituminous binders for asphalt roads.

Cremasco said Downer's new Plastiphalt, which also adds plastics from bags, is "better than straight-run virgin asphalt" because of the polymers from the soft plastic and toner.

"In service, it doesn't look or feel any different, but will last longer," he said. "We have done lab tests and pre-production tests with slabs to confirm how the product responds to heat, moisture and fatigue."

Plastiphalt is equivalent to premium asphalt, so it is less prone to cracking and fatigue and suitable for roadways bearing heavy traffic and high-weight vehicles.

Cremasco said once more tests are conducted with Plastiphalt he hopes local councils and governments will specify the product. "They are paying more to process recyclables and need a proven solution," he said.

"It's a big market. We would need to ramp up for national production, which will take time, and modify production facilities for these additives. "We need to solve some logistical issues."

For example, the production plant currently can only manufacture 150 metric tons of Plastiphalt an hour, compared to 300 metric tons of traditional virgin material asphalt.

"We did the demonstration [road at Craigieburn] to show we have a solution to the problem. When [potential customers] are ready, we can get all our ducks in a row to ramp up for commercial production," he said.

"This sustainable, cost-competitive road has a 65 percent improvement in fatigue life and a superior resistance to deformation, making the road last longer, and allowing it to better handle heavy vehicle traffic," Cremasco said.

While Downer's Plastiphalt is on the road, it may have competition from a very similarly-named program in New Zeland.

Christchurch-based Fulton Hogan (FH) developed its product called PlastiPhalt, and registered the trademark in New Zealand. In April, it tested the materials by paving part of Christchurch International Airport's fire station with 250 metric tons of the product. The asphalt mix included 3,100 4-liter plastic oil containers, collected by FH from garages as part of an oil recycling program.

FH environmental and sustainability manager Sophie Kennedy said the containers previously went to landfill because oil contamination means they cannot be recycled. She said FH started PlastiPhalt lab trials in 2014. It shreds the containers, granulates the shreds, and incorporates them into the pavement.

Plastics News Europe contributed to this report.