Completed Project: Innovative Manufacturing of Crumb Rubber Modified Asphalt Concrete
Crumb rubber from tires are used in asphalt concrete as a performance enhancing additive. Many countries mandate its use as an important waste reduction measure. This project aims to maximize the valorisation potential of crumb rubber from waste tires, with their recycling in asphalt road pavements as well as to demonstrate and validate the developed eco-innovative technologies in real-life environments in terms of their environmental and economic viability in order to promote their widespread market uptake and replication.
This cooperative project funded by Innosuisse (former commission for technology and innovation (KTI/CTI)) brings together all important stakeholders; crumb rubber producer, asphalt plant manufacturer and two asphalt plants. In addition to the road engineering lab at Empa the advanced analytical methods lab investigates the environmental aspects and Prof. Dr. Guillaume Habert from ETH Zurich chair for sustainable materials performs the life cycle analysis.
Crumb rubber is produced using the water jet technique by the Swiss company TRS
Starting date: 2017
End date: 2019
Publications
- Poulikakos, L.D., Buttlar, W., Schüwer, N., Lo Presti, D., Balmer, T., Bueno, M. Can crumb rubber modifier effectively replace the use of polymer- modified bitumen in asphalt mixture? (2021) Sustainable and Resilient Infrastructure, DOI: 10.1080/23789689.2021.1965428
- Bueno, M., Haag, R., Heeb, N. et al. Functional and environmental performance of plant-produced crumb rubber asphalt mixtures using the dry process. Mater Struct 54, 194 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1617/s11527-021-01790-y
- Rodríguez-Fernández, I, Tarpoudi Baheri, F , Cavalli, MC; Poulikakos, LD, Bueno, M. Microstructure analysis and mechanical performance of crumb rubber modified asphalt concrete using the dry process Construction and Building Materials 259 (2020) 119662
- Rodríguez-Fernández, I., Cavalli, M.C., Poulikakos, L., Bueno, M. Recyclability of asphalt mixtures with crumb rubber incorporated by dry process: A laboratory investigation (2020) Materials, 13 (12), art. no. 2870, DOI: 10.3390/ma13122870
- Rodríguez-Fernández, I., Cavalli, M.C., Poulikakos, L.D., Bueno, M. Long-term aging behaviour of asphalt mixtures modified with crumb rubber using the dry process. (2020) Lecture Notes in Civil Engineering, 48, pp. 224-232. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-29779-4_22
