Taking the green agenda forward, the Uttar Pradesh government is looking to lay more than 4,100 km of roads made of waste plastic.
The targetted construction of 639 roads totalling 4,108 km would recycle an estimated 2,650 tonnes of waste plastic in UP.
Plastic roads are reckoned as an effective solution to reduce road construction and maintenance carbon footprint. The use of plastic waste in roads contributes to the conservation of fossil fuels, and decreases carbon dioxide emissions.
According to UP chief secretary Durga Shankar Mishra, the safe disposal of plastic waste has now become critical for ecological balance and environment.
Most plastic roads consist of waste plastic, which is used to replace bitumen mixed with recycled asphalt. Such road construction material is also referred to as plastic asphalt.
“The substitution of bitumen with waste plastic in the construction of roads has large untapped potential. Under the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana, priority has been accorded to plastic road projects,” he underlined.
He claimed waste plastic roads were sturdier, since they are more resistant to damage from water.
On an average, 10 percent of plastic waste is used in the construction of roads and highways. Plastic waste roads are being built across the country including major cities like Delhi, Pune, Chennai, Indore, Jamshedpur, Lucknow etc.
Meanwhile, the state has employed the GPS based monitoring system for central and state government road projects for transparency so time and cost overruns are avoided.
The state government is giving emphasis on improving the rural road connectivity for faster movement of farm and dairy produce from villages to cities and food processing centres. This is aimed at enhancing rural incomes and facilitating prosperity in the hinterland.
The freshly laid roads are being geo-tagged for maintaining financial propriety in the allocation of funds to developers.
Besides, the state roads are being developed under the novel full depth reclamation (FDR) technology to save on earth and financial resources.
FDR is an in-place recycling method for reconstruction of existing flexible pavements using the existing pavement/road section material as the base for the new roadway-wearing surface.
With the newly introduced FDR method, the state agencies have more than half-million truckloads (tandem) in road construction so far.
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Moreover, the rural and tertiary roads are also being linked with state and national highways apart from expressways to promote transportation of passenger and goods, while spurring tourism, trade, business and industrial growth.