Midland, Mich. — In collaboration with Meijer, Dow has enabled a new paving technique using recycled plastic bags to create a more durable parking lot for the retailer’s Holland, Mich., supercenter. This recycled polymer modified asphalt (RPMA) parking lot is a three-phase pilot project that used approximately 12,500 pounds of post-consumer recycled plastic (PCR), which is the equivalent weight of 944,000 plastic grocery bags.
This project brings recycled plastic bags full circle, and also represents a long term collaboration between two Michigan companies working toward a more sustainable future.
“Meijer operates under the philosophy that to be a good company, we must be a good neighbor and that often means working with other likeminded companies on a common goal,” says Rick Keyes, president and CEO of Meijer. “We are committed to lessening our impact on the environment and are pleased to partner with our customers and Dow in the largest in-state project of this kind to better demonstrate our commitment to a circular economy through recycling and reusing plastic to better ensure a more sustainable future.”
All of the recycled plastic used for the parking lot pilot project was deposited by Meijer customers through the retailer’s in-store plastic film recycling program. In 2014, Meijer placed a collection bin inside the front entrances of each of its stores for customers to deposit clean, dry plastic bags and films. This year, Meijer expects to recycle 6 million pounds of plastics through this program.
“Lessening our impact on the environment through increased recycling efforts is an issue that’s important to us, which is why we believe this pilot project is just one of the ways we can bring our current recycling efforts full circle while improving our customer shopping experience,” says Vik Srinivasan, senior vice president of properties and real estate at Meijer.
Powered by ELVALOY™ Reactive Elastomeric Terpolymer (RET) technology from Dow, these RPMA projects have increased durability versus unmodified asphalt.
“This is an exciting partnership from start to finish and a perfect example of how the plastics used to keep food safe and fresh, like bread bags, can have a new life as infrastructure like a parking lot,” says CJ DuBois, North American paving application development leader, Dow Packaging and Specialty Plastics. “Our collaboration with Meijer began 2 years ago. This RPMA parking lot made with recycled content and our ELVALOY™ RET is just one example of how we’re continually creating new technologies and initiatives to transform used plastics into functional and valuable solutions.”
This pilot project incorporated numerous partners to take the recycled plastics and turn them into a resurfaced parking lot. PADNOS, a materials recycler, aggregated the Meijer recycled plastics, and converted them into usable PCR content. K-Tech Specialty Coatings, an asphalt emulsion company, modified the base asphalt binder with ELVALOY™ RET and PCR content. Rieth-Riley, the construction contractor, produced the final hot-mix asphalt and paved the Meijer parking lot and gas station.
Meijer is a Grand Rapids, Mich.-based retailer that operates 258 supercenters and grocery stores throughout Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky and Wisconsin. For more information, visit www.meijer.com.
Dow’s portfolio of plastics, industrial intermediates, coatings and silicones businesses delivers a broad range of differentiated science-based products and solutions for its customers. Dow operates 106 manufacturing sites in 31 countries. For more information, visit www.dow.com.
SOURCE: Meijer