Barnet Council has said its highways contractor is achieving ‘significant improvements in the sustainability of road resurfacing’ with new asphalt technology that uses rubber waste from tyres and reduces embodied carbon.
Tarmac Kier Joint Venture (TKJV) recently resurfaced a road in the London borough using granulated rubber from end-of-life recycled tyres.
Tarmac’s ULTIPAVE R, a rubber modified stone mastic asphalt (SMA) uses warm mix asphalt technology to achieve a reduced carbon footprint, typically 8% lower than the equivalent conventional SMA.
TKJV’s surfacing team laid around 240 tonnes of the material in a single shift as part of a new surface course at Hill Top. The chosen surface used 35mm of 10mm Rubber Modified SMA 40/60 polished stone value (PSV) 60 incorporating steel slag aggregate, with rubber crumb added in place of fibres and warm mix binder.
Tarmac said that steel slag aggregate was sourced from its facility at its steel works in Port Talbot, South Wales, and transferred to London by rail to reduce embodied carbon.
The contractor said it is 'classed as zero CO2 rated'.
Peter Hyde, Tarmac Kier JV board member, said: ‘It’s extremely positive to see Barnet Council delivering environmental savings by leveraging this new technology and unlocking the benefits of a circular economic approach.'
Peter Zinkin, vice chairman of Barnet Council’s environment committee, said: ‘This approach in Barnet helps the council as part of its demanding sustainability strategy, while maximising the reuse of end-of-life tyres which would have been exported as waste.
‘Materials technology in road resurfacing has moved forward and really significant improvements in the sustainability of road resurfacing are being achieved with our new joint venture contractor and Tarmac’s materials skills.’
Tarmac Kier has calculated that up to 500 waste tyres could be recycled in every kilometre of road resurfaced with the ULTIPAVE R solution.
