The first roads made of recycled plastic are in Rotterdam

The city council of Rotterdam is currently examining the PlasticRoad project, that makes use of prefabricated modules entirely made of recycled plastic (mainly obtained from post consumer bottles) to replace the road surfacing currently in use. According to the Dutch company VolkerWessels, which has proposed the project to the city council, roads made using recycled plastic could cut down on the pollution linked to asphalt, which is each year responsible for the emission of million tons of carbon dioxide at a global level. As well as causing less pollution than traditional road surfacing, PlasticRoad is also more reliable and capable of resisting extreme temperatures (from the coldest -40°C to the hottest 80°C), requiring less maintenance. Thanks to the greater resistance to abrasion and extreme temperatures, roads made using recycled plastic, assures VolkerWessels, are capable of lasting three times longer as compared to traditional asphalt surfacing used up to now. Furthermore, thanks to its hollow structure, PlasticRoad facilitates the installation of cables and pipes that can be positioned inside. Finally, laying roads made of plastic is much simpler and faster as compared to asphalt surfacing. The prefabricated blocks can be positioned on the roads in only few weeks (as compared to the months required by traditional asphalt), reducing the inconvenience to motorists linked to the traffic and deviations caused by roadworks. The project is still under development, but the company hopes to be able to lay down the first road network of this type in the space of three years. Jaap Peters, a member of the city council office that is involved in engineering of Rotterdam, declared: “We are very positive about the potential of PlasticRoad. Rotterdam is a city open to experimentation and innovative adaptation and we have a “street lab” at our disposal in order to test innovations of this type”.