VolkerWessels Designs Recycled Plastic Roads

Here at Riggotts, we’re always interested in innovation that has the potential to make road travel safer, cleaner and more efficient. Recently, world-renowned Dutch construction services company and Riggott’s client, VolkerWessels, has designed a road surface made entirely from recycled plastic salvaged from oceans and incineration plants. In addition to being environmentally friendly, it is also more durable, less sensitive to extreme temperatures, and would require less upkeep.

VolkerWessels’ plastic roads will come in prefabricated sections that can be fit into place onsite, greatly reducing construction time. Best of all, using recycled plastic will save the atmosphere up to 1.6 million tons of CO2 released by asphalt each year.

Though the plan only exists on paper, there’s proof that replacing asphalt with plastic is a viable solution. A city in India has paved close to 50 kilometres of roads with a mixture of recycled plastic and asphalt, which has been a safe and durable solution to roads that would otherwise need yearly maintenance.

So, what would plastic roads mean for Riggotts? Well, any raw road surface would still need lining and marking to ensure drivers and pedestrians are as safe as possible. Though adhesion of pre-existing marking paints and materials to a non-asphalt surface may differ, we’re always ready for the challenge of modifying the way we work to keep up with technological evolution. And when an industry development means a safer and less-polluted world, we can’t think of a better reason to adapt our technology accordingly.