This is a very interesting and worthwhile news coverage given that I just came back from a road trip and encountered several roads and streets full of potholes.

According to a recent press release from French oil company, TOTAL, the world’s first PlasticRoad bike path was recently opened in Zwolle, Overijssel in the Netherlands, which is made from recycled plastic. The concept was presented three years ago by road construction company KWS, and the concept was developed into a product by partners Total and Wavin, a supplier of plastic pipe systems and solutions in Europe.

The bike path is 30 meters long containing recycled plastic equivalent to more than 218,000 plastic cups or 500,000 plastic bottle caps.  This pilot project is located next to Deventerstraatweg between Lindestraat and Verenigingstraat, and is equipped with sensors to monitor the road’s performance including temperature, the number of bike passages and the durability of the road.

A second bike path pilot in Giethoorn, near the pilot in Zwolle, will be opened in November.  The PlasticRoad partners are looking for new locations to launch subsequent pilots to test other applications such as parking lots, train platforms and sidewalks.

According to the press release, there are 350m tons of plastics used every year worldwide and the largest portion of plastic reaching end-of-life is still landfilled or incinerated. In Europe, all plastic applications together contain only 7% recycled plastic, according to a 2017 report from Deloitte.