Innovative and Sustainable Solutions to Reduce Pollution of Roads and Road

Research Project, 2018 – 2020

To create a sustainable transport infrastructure, it is essential to prevent pollution from our roads as efficiently as possible. In this project, a guidance is developed for the design of maintenance, or built-in functions in the road environment, to meet global environmental issues such as microplastics and polluted particles from road traffic. As functional procurement is getting more common, it is very important from a contract perspective, that these issues are managed cost and resource-efficiently over the entire period of infrastructure operation. Vehicles and wear from road materials contributeto contamination of road surfaces and road runoff with particles, metals, organic pollutants and microplastics. In our cities, several major infrastructure contracts are taking place, which generates heavy traffic with high road-surface wear and a risk of major contamination when dirt is extracted from construction sites. Different methods and techniques for cleaning vehicles, streets and treating road runoff are compared, and the best methods for preventing transport of dirt and contamination to the surrounding environment are identified using multi-criteria decision analysis.

The project investigates different methods for vehicle wash and street sweeping, and end-of-pipe solutions of road runoff e.g. sedimentation and sorption filters. The most important issue from a sustainability perspective is: which combination of methods and technologies is most sustainable and effective? The results of the project are communicated, disseminated and provide guidance for implementing innovative maintenance methods and prevention technologies for pollution caused by roads and traffic.