DutchNews, September 17, 2015
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| An artist's impression of how the plastic roads would work |
Dutch company KWS Infra is
developing a new sort of road made from recycled plastic. This, the company
says, will not only cut down on plastic waste but reduce CO2 output from road
building and usage, and make roads more sustainable and safer. Esther O’Toole
reports.
An estimated eight billion tons of plastic is floating around in the
oceans and 55% of our plastic waste is still incinerated. Innovative Dutch
companies have been busy looking at feasible ways of fishing the plastic out of
the sea and shipping it to shore. Now KWS Infra, part of the VolkerWessels
construction group and the biggest road builder in the Netherlands, has come up
with a plan to turn that kind of plastic waste into roads.
The roads themselves
would be made from prefab sections prepared offsite from 100% recycled plastic
and brought en masse to the building site, with road markings and guard rails
already in place. Being light weight and easy to transport they could take
months off construction times.
The fabric is thought to be more durable than
asphalt and needs little or no maintenance, being weather proof and impervious
to weeds. The other major advantage is that they are hollow allowing space for
piping, electric cables and – another hot topic for VolkerWessels – internet
connections.
Internet
VolkerWessels is now investing in multiple projects for
urban renewal and connected city innovation, including placing internet
receivers along roads, be they antennas and masts or embedded in street lights
and wind turbines. Plastic roads fit into this picture perfectly. If the space
inside the decking could also be used to house net connectors, losing reception
in a tunnel would become a thing of the past.
Driverless cars, cheap and
affordable ones too, will be on the open market as early as next year. What
benefits will be reaped from these innovative technologies when they begin to
converge? With uninterrupted mobile internet connections along all main
highways, a long commute could be set to become the most productive part of the
day.
No wonder then that VolkerWessels is not having trouble garnering interest
for their projects. Rotterdam city council was the first to show interest in
piloting the PlasticRoad, in early July.
Interest
Since then the company has
had interest from cities all over the world and are looking to finalise
partnerships with plastics and recycling experts soon, spokesman Anne Koudstaal
told DutchNews.nl. The aim is to have a team in place by December and to run a
feasibility pilot within three years.
‘We are feeling very positive about it,’
he said. ‘All the good reactions [to July’s announcement] are a huge boost for
us and the idea. It makes it all seem so much more realisable.’
If all goes to
plan, the roads themselves may in turn be recyclable. This would bring
PlasticRoad completely in line with the ‘cradle to cradle’ notions of the
circular economy being implemented by other innovative ideas such as The Ocean Clean Up Project and the Plastic Madonna art project.
The Netherlands, despite
being one of the smallest countries in the developed world by land mass, has
one of the highest carbon footprints per capita; especially in relation to fossil
fuel use and cement production. Cutting emissions related to road usage and
building would seriously reduce that footprint. Especially when one considers
that the road network in the country covers approximately 135,470 km and most
of it is tarmacked.
Related Article:
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| An impression of how the system might look. Photo: Ocean Cleanup |
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