oad transport is one of the largest contributors to carbon emissions across the world. Initially, the thought goes to vehicles and the need to adopt alternative fuels, but road maintenance and resurfacing are undoing the hard work carried out by automotive companies to decarbonise the industry.
A case study on La Abundancia-Florencia, a new road construction project in San Carlos, Costa Rica, determined that for each kilometre (km) of the road—made with hot mix asphalt—around 65.8kg of CO2 equivalent. Overall, the production of hot mix asphalt (HMA) contributes to around 38% of life cycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
The high percentage contribution comes at no surprise as the process is highly-polluting and the vehicles used in road resurfacing are yet to be decarbonised. So, what can firms do to reduce carbon?
