PNW has been experimenting with a version of this for a while involving old tires. Rather than let them continue to disintegrate in a landfill somewhere, adding them to newer roads allows the road to withstand freezing weather much better, reducing the need for carbon emitting repairs, increasing road lifespan (and therefore tire lifespan, which in turn reduces microplastic shedding by tires), and gives a second useful life to the plastics we already have.

[–] zabadoh@ani.social 4 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

So given that we can already add crumbled tire waste to asphalt, without adding new types of nano particles to the environment, it seems like this article is yet more greenwashing propaganda the plastics industry trying to find a use for waste plastic.

[–] dudleyflippendoodle@lemmy.zip 1 points 18 hours ago* (last edited 18 hours ago) (1 children)

The article probably is and I’m not pretending to be an expert. Just saying in theory this could be useful ¯\(ツ)/¯

I’m against plastic use where possible, but don’t see a problem in putting what we already have to work if the alternative is to just let it fall apart on its own somewhere else. If we’re going to drown in this stuff might at least get some usefulness out of it.

[–] HasturInYellow@lemmy.world 1 points 20 minutes ago

As long as we don produce more plastic for this purpose, yes