Sahadat Hossain. Credit: UT Arlington
Key points:
- A sustainability leader has developed “plastic road” to fill in cracks in highways.
- The development will now be implemented in some areas of Texas, marking the use of the state’s first plastic road.
- This innovative use of plastic is making infrastructure construction more sustainable in other areas, as well.
A civil engineering professor at University of Texas at Arlington (UTA) has found a great way to utilize both recycled and un-recycled plastic waste products to fill in surface cracks and rutting in roads. It’s the first use of what’s called “plastic road” material in Texas.
Over the last three years, Sahadat Hossain, director of the UTA Solid Waste Institute for Sustainability, and his team successfully completed a laboratory investigation examining the reuse of waste plastics in asphalt.
Now, the first plastic road implementation project will be in Kaufman, about 35 miles west of Dallas. The use of plastic road is expected to improve the durability and strength of highway pavement, and serve as a replacement for bitumen in asphalt pavement roads.
“This is a perfect example of reuse of recycled materials for circular economy and green economy,” said Hossain.
In a separate project, Hossain developed moisture barriers aimed at reducing cracks and strengthening the durability of highway pavement and shoulders. The modified barriers will be placed at five locations in the Fort Worth area and two locations in Dallas.
Hossain is also leading a third project, which involves the use of 10-feet-long recycled plastic pins that will be driven into the soil to stabilize highway soil slopes.
Melanie Sattler, interim chair of UTA’s Department of Civil Engineering, said other states are following Hossain’s lead and adopting recycled plastic pins to shore up failing highway embankments.
Hossain is now conducting research on how to make landfill recycling and landfills more sustainable.