Roads made from cigarette butts
RMIT researchers develop solution to toxic cigarette waste by turning butts into roadsAccording to the Cigarette Litter Org, about six trillion cigarette butts are produced worldwide each year, resulting in more than 1.2 million tonnes of cigarette butt waste.
When a smoker discards their used butt, the dangerous chemicals leach into the environment, threatening water quality and marine life. Cigarette butts are a form of non-biodegradable litter and can take up to 12 months to break down in freshwater and up to five years in seawater.
Despite various education programs run by Clean Up Australia and the increase in fines and penalties for littering, world cigarette litter is expected to double by 2025.
But it’s not all Dunhill from here.
A research team at Melbourne’s RMIT University could pave the way in reducing cigarette butt pollution by mixing butts in asphalt and turning them into roads and other building materials.
The research team is headed up by Dr Abbas Mohajerani, who became world-renowned in 2016 for his research in how fired-clay bricks made with cigarette butts can save energy.
Dr Mohajerani has been trying to find both a sustainable and practical method to solving cigarette butt pollution for several years.
The testing process undertaken by him and his team revealed that the compounds in cigarette butts could reduce thermal conductivity and the ‘urban heat island’ problem which is common in urban environments.
“In this research, we encapsulated the cigarette butts with bitumen and paraffin wax to lock in the chemicals and prevent any leaching from the asphalt concrete.
“The encapsulated cigarettes butts were mixed with hot asphalt mix for making samples,” Dr Mohajerani said.
“Encapsulated cigarette butts developed in this research will be a new construction material which can be used in different applications and lightweight composite products”.
Dr Mohajerani believes that if cigarette butts were used in Australian roads on a large scale, toxic litter could be dramatically reduced.
The project has been published in the journal of Construction and Building Materials and appears to have wide appeal.
The question is now whether or not Australian governments and councils will warm to a solution that could eventually see cigarette litter burnout.
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