[OCTOBER THEMATIC REPORT] Roads made out of Plastic ? [Eco-Friendly Waste Management]by Vyomm Khanna | 27-10-2021 04:55 |
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 With daily innovations, easy availability and falling prices , it's no surprise that plastic is present everywhere in our daily lives. However, apart from revolutionising our way of life, plastic has a large huge number of negative environmental consequences. Plastic is one of the most prevalent and widespread types of waste that exist in the ecosystem today. Be it choking animals in the ocean, spoiling the landscape above land, or even being suspended as tiny particles in the air, Plastic is truly everywhere. This is definitely an extremely unfavourable circumstance, but what if it had a hidden benefit ? What if we were somehow able to salvage waste plastic not only to recycle cosmetic products like bags or tyres, but to do something on a colossally larger scale ? What if we could build plastic roads ?  Pioneered by an Indian Scientist, this vision became a reality.Stretching from the city of New Delhi to nearby Meerut, a game-changing new road was laid using a system developed by Rajagopalan Vasudevan, a professor of chemistry at the Thiagarajar College of Engineering in India, which replaces 10% of a road's bitumen with repurposed plastic waste. This idea might seem rather outlandish at first glance as it is nearly impossible to imagine how plastic present in bags, shoes and other daily products possibly be of any value to road building materials. However, rather than being a hindrance, when plastic is added to the road-building mixture, it actually increased the load bearing capacity, resistance to wetting, and greatly reduced pothole formation according to a detailed study conducted by R.Vasudevan (and a number of others). Since this mind-blowing discovery, India has been quick to capitalise on its benefits, and according to the Union Road Transport and Highways Minister, 703 km of National Highways have already been constructed with the use of plastic waste. As this solution is highly beneficial, I wholeheartedly urge all ambassadors (and others too !) reading this to advocate and spread the benefits of plastic roads, as they can go a long way in helping us battle the problem of ecosystem degradation. Sources: 1) https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20210302-could- plastic-roads-make-for-a-smoother-ride) 2) https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S09500 61811004648 3) https://www.indiatvnews.com/news/india/highway-road-construction-plastic-waste-transport-ministry-722932
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