The transport sector in Germany clearly missed its climate targets again in 2023. With 145 million tonnes of CO2-emissions, the sector target set out in the Climate Protection Act was exceeded by 12 million tonnes. The climate-friendly renovation of the road network with recycled rubber asphalt can make an important contribution to reducing emissions and to the sustainable transformation of mobility. Stephan Rau, Technical Managing Director of NEW LIFE patron wdk, will be giving a presentation on this topic at Tire Tech Expo 2024 in Hanover on 20 March 2024: Sustainable optimisation of Europe's road quality with recycled rubber asphalt.
Around 95% of all road surfaces in Germany consist of asphalt. Around 95% of this consists of rock and sand mixtures and 5% of binders (bitumen). Bitumen is a black, semi-volatile substance obtained from crude oil. Bitumen is liquid at high temperatures but solidifies quickly when it cools, which makes it easier to process but causes problems in extreme weather conditions.
In order to reduce weather-related damage to asphalt, bitumen for road construction is increasingly being modified with new polymers. Until recently, the synthetic elastomer SBS was primarily used for this purpose. The ecologically and economically superior alternative is the modification of bitumen for road construction with fine rubber powder from recycled old tyres.
The high-quality, unmixed rubber from used tyres is shredded and crushed in an environmentally friendly manner until the desired grain size is achieved. If five to ten percent of the recycled rubber powder from used tyres is added to the bitumen binder, this improves the road quality in many ways. Recycled rubber powder from used tyres for bitumen modification in road construction adheres excellently to the rock and can be applied effortlessly, without disturbing adhesions or clumping.
The added rubber powder prevents weather-related cracking, joints or ruts in the road surface, which significantly increases the service life of roads and motorways, minimises maintenance costs and avoids roadworks or traffic jams. Of course, this also pays off in economic terms.
The environmentally friendly recycling of used tyre rubber into rubber powder for the modification of road construction bitumen has numerous positive ecological effects. Valuable raw materials are kept in the cycle. This helps to avoid waste and conserve natural resources (especially rubber). In addition, every tonne of used tyres that is recycled in an environmentally friendly way and not incinerated saves around 700 kg of CO2-emissions.
