Modification of asphalt by packaging waste‐polyethylene

Abstract The “white pollution” made of packaging waste polymers and its recycling has become a common issue. In this article, the retrieved waste milk‐packing bag (its main ingredients was polyethylene) was selected to modify the ordinary oil asphalt. Asphalt was modified with 1, 3, 6, and 9 wt% content of waste‐polyethylene. The results showed that the softening point and the freeze‐to‐crack stress of asphalt increased the penetration and the freeze‐to‐crack temperature decreased after modification. The comprehensive performance of raw asphalt improved noticeably. Infrared analysis suggests that waste‐polyethylene in packaging (WPE) combines the matrix of asphalt through physical mixture modification. And the modification mechanism of WPE was studied by the analysis of its micro structure, the characteristics of WPE, the effects of Crack pinning and Silver Shear yield in the decentralized process. Using waste packaging polymers to modify the asphalt proved to be an ideal way, for not only solving the problem of “white pollution”, but also for improving the performance of asphalt. POLYM. COMPOS., 2008. © 2008 Society of Plastics Engineers