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Cigarette Butt Pellets Boost Durability and Cut Energy Use in Recycled Asphalt

Published in Construction and Building Materials, findings confirm that cigarette-filter pellets enhance crack resistance in asphalt, lowering its production energy demands.

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Crack resistant asphalt using cigarette butts

Overview

  • Smokers discard nearly 9 trillion cigarette filters annually, creating a persistent environmental hazard that degrades extremely slowly in soils, waterways and marine ecosystems.
  • Researchers crushed cellulose fibers and PLA plastic from discarded filters, mixed them with Fischer-Tropsch wax under heat and pressure to form pellets that release reinforcing fibers in hot bitumen.
  • LabIC. UGR tests of asphalt containing 40 percent reclaimed pavement and cigarette-filter pellets demonstrate superior crack resistance and flexibility under traffic and thermal loads compared with conventional mixtures.
  • Wax in the pellets lowers bitumen viscosity, enabling reduced mixing temperatures and cutting energy consumption and pollutant emissions in asphalt production.
  • Research teams are planning follow-on studies to optimize pellet fabrication and increase recycling agent content for further enhancements in recycled asphalt performance.