Ecopetrol Group and El Dorado Airport unveil the first road section paved with recycled plastic
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Ecopetrol Group and El Dorado Airport unveil the first road section paved with recycled plastic
Oct 13, 2022
- This is the first time this technique is used in the country, conforming to current regulatory standards.
- The intervened road section is located in the vicinity of the El Dorado International Airport in Bogotá.
- This type of paving is friendlier to the environment and provides the asphalt with greater durability and resistance.
The Ecopetrol Group and El Dorado Airport unveiled this past Thursday the first road section paved with modified asphalt containing recycled plastic, following current national regulatory standards for such projects.
The paving of the road section located close to the airport terminal employed an asphalt mixture containing 125,000 plastic bags, one of the greatest pollutants in ecosystems and with low-level utilization in standard recycling processes due to its difficult recovery.
This initiative was possible thanks to the involvement of MPI, a specialized company that worked to develop the formula to incorporate post-consumer plastic into asphalt. Reciclene, a Plastilene Group company, was also part of this initiative, helping to classify and process the post-consumer plastic to obtain a product that met the required use conditions for the application.
Additional roads will be paved using this method In the coming months, including interior roads in Ecopetrol's Barrancabermeja Refinery and operating roads in the Rubiales field, as well as works managed by the Bogotá’s Road Maintenance Unit (UMV for its Spanish acronym) and other road concessions throughout the country.
“We are pleased to pioneer in Colombia the application of this form of asphalt, which is environmentally friendlier and meets the highest quality standards. Our objective is to commodify its use throughout the national roadway system and continue working to make our products increasingly more sustainable, incorporating circular economy processes into our activities to ensure the efficient and responsible use of our resources," said Felipe Bayón, CEO of the Ecopetrol Group.
Among the most rewarding benefits of this technique is the reduction in the volume of plastics that reaches water sources and landfills, as well as supporting the collection chain and the work of waste pickers (recicladores) by endorsing plastic waste as a value-generating good.
Additionally, incorporating recycled plastic into asphalt improves the product’s mechanical properties by optimizing quality in line with high-performance criteria, namely withstanding heavy traffic, providing greater durability versus traditional mixtures and resisting high road temperatures.
“Our work with Ecopetrol, beyond an alliance is a commitment to sponsor the circular economy from the standpoint of the business sector, to continue to care for and preserve our planet. As of now, Opain will conduct quarterly measurements to analyze the behavior of this pavement and include it in the periodic maintenance work done on the asphalt of the road network surrounding El Dorado and the taxiways included in the concession area. With this initiative, we hope in the near future to include the plastic waste generated in the passenger terminal into the modified asphalt mixture to be used in El Dorado”, said Mauricio Ossa, president of Odinsa and chairperson of the Board of Directors of Opain.
The Ecopetrol Group is working to guarantee the availability of this product in the market through facilities already in operation, such as Reciclene, or that are close to starting ancillary activities, such as Esenttia, a Group subsidiary.
This latter plant will begin operations in the second half of 2023, with the capacity to process 12,000 tons per year of recycled plastic resins including polypropylene and polyethylene, among others.
The application of asphalt containing recycled plastic is part of the portfolio of Circular Economy Solutions that the Ecopetrol Group has been implementing within the framework of its TESG strategy, which already boasts 445 initiatives.
Bogota, October 13, 2022
