Bengaluru: In what comes as a phenomenal way of getting rid of single-use plastic, considered harmful to the environment, the Uttar Pradesh government will use such plastic to construct about 1500kms of road, reports Times of India.  

The project will be completed by the end of the financial year. 

A proposal was sent by the Public Works Department in this regard. 

When the project is completed, the gains would be massive in the sense that as much as 2000 tonnes of plastic would be gotten rid of and the expediting of road construction would also have been completed.

“We initiated the project last year by constructing 12 roads in various parts of the state on a pilot basis. It was found suitable. We have now adopted the process in SOR and get it mainstreamed in road construction,” said principal secretary, PWD, Nitin Ramesh Gokarn, as reported by Times of India. 

The target will be increased in the coming future. 

How is plastic waste used in road construction? 

The entire process is very simple. The plastic waste material is first shredded to a particular size with the help of a shredding machine. The plastic waste coated aggregate is mixed with hot bitumen and the resulting mix is used for road construction. The road laying temperature is 110-120 degrees Celsius, the website delineates. 

What is to be noted here is that such roads – constructed using waste plastic – have a really long durability and the quality has been found to be satisfactory. 

The concept of using such waste in constructing such roads was brought in the year 2015 by the central government after Padma Sri Rajagopalan Vasudevan, a professor from Madurai’s Thiagarajar College of Engineering recommended it. 

This practice also goes a long way in getting rid of plastic and garbage and making India a cleaner and greener country.