Plastic Waste Used for Road Construction by Indian Army

Guwahati, Nov 28 (HS): Indian Army has always been conscious towards maintaining a healthy environment and has endeavored to enhance its green footprint and employ methods to reduce pollution. It has undertaken numerous drives under the Swatch Bharat Abhiyan and contributed immensely towards this facet.

In line with the Govt’s mission against single use plastic, the Military Engineer Services which provides rear line engineering support to the Armed Forces is undertaking a pilot project for road construction utilizing plastic as partial substitute to bitumen.

This ambitious project has been undertaken at Narangi Military Station where approximately 1.24 MT of waste plastic has been used to construct a road using the technology. In this technology, the road is constructed by mixing shredded plastic waste with heated bitumen. This is a green technology, which aims to reduce menace of plastic waste at one hand and improve the durability of the roads on the other.

The project to use plastic in road building is an initiative to reduce, reuse and recycle waste plastic. The road constructed using waste plastic lasts longer, is cheaper to build and maintain and significantly reduces the amount of plastic going into our oceans and landfills.

Utilisation of waste plastic in road construction can help in significantly solving one of the biggest problems of plastic waste management. On successful completion of this project, the tested concept will be advocated in MES for road construction works in various Cantonments and Military Stations.