Project description
Revolutionising the paving industry
To mitigate the effects of climate change and minimise harm to individuals globally, numerous sectors and industries have had to adjust by embracing innovative technologies that decrease their environmental footprint. The paving industry is no exception. Present requirements are compelling the sector to modernise, aiming to reduce both environmental and financial costs, while also prioritising noise reduction and environmental friendliness. The EU-funded SILENT RUBBER PAVE project has been initiated to support the industry in attaining these objectives by introducing a cost-effective method that enables the utilisation of crumb rubber. This innovative approach aims to meet these demands and establish itself as the preferred choice in the industry.
Objective
Paving industry sector faces nowadays different challenges as the need for less maintenance, more silent and more environmental friendly pavements. The use of crumb rubber (CR) derived from end‐of‐life tires (ELTs) in bituminous mixtures replies to all these needs however its wide implementation has not been extended due mainly of the following barriers that prevent its wide implementation are:
i. A crumb rubber alone cannot be placed directly into the mixes (dry method) because it will swell and absorb the bitumen causing raveling in the roads
ii. The wet method works well but requires that every contractor buys expensive equipment
iii. If crumb rubber is used in terminal blends it is essentially a waste of product because over time it becomes all digested
The solution proposed in this initiative to overcome these barriers is the use of use of reacted and activated rubber that it can be used directly into the plugmill of a contractor’s plant. The SILENT RUBBER PAVEMENTS project main goal is to market uptake and achieve a wider deployment of the RARX technology, based in a patent of CONSULALPV, that has the best of both methods:
• Easy to apply and use as in the “dry method”
• Performance and cost effectiveness beyond that of the “wet method”
To enter in the global market, two large companies (Valoriza SM- Composan) have made an agreement with a specialized SME (Consulpav, a first industrial applicant) who has developed and patented the RARX technology to exploit at European level. SACYR, a multinational pavement construction company present in more than 20 countries, will be the responsible for the pilot construction in different climate and evaluation. Our distributor in Italy, FHL group will assist the consortia in internationalizing our commercialization strategy.
Fields of science
Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
IA - Innovation actionCoordinator
28007 MADRID
Spain