Goodbye Potholes
by Miki Saxon
Do you hate it when roads you travel often are torn up for weeks/months in order to repave them?
I do. I also hate the pollution manufacturing asphalt causes, not to mention the choice between driving on potholes or seeing my taxes paying to do the same road over and over.
Things are about to change — finally!
“New synthetic binders are going to transform the global road construction or road rehabilitation marketplace, and they’re going to allow for roads to be 100% recycled,” says Sean Weaver, president of TechniSoil Industrial, the company that designed the new process. “That’s always been the holy grail of the road construction market—could you recycle 100% of the top surface of the road, grind it up, crush it, and put it right back down, and have that be as durable as the original hot mixed asphalt road.”
Even better, the process uses recycled PET plastic (think water bottles) to replace bitumen and the result is far stronger than the original.
Considering the fact that so much US infrastructure, especially roads/streets/highways are badly deteriorated TechniSoil’s innovation couldn’t come at a better time.
After it’s tested in LA the main problem will be getting (forcing) bureaucracies and politicians to use it.
And that means overcoming entrenched players, with powerful lobbying and money to buy the pols.
Image credit: TechniSoil Industrial
