The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike will blend 450 tonnes of plastic with tar and use it to asphalt roads in its southern zone. The civic body has assigned KK Plastic Waste Management, a firm located off Kanakapura Road near Anjanapura, to supply plastic.
“We had signed a memorandum of understanding with the company to supply plastic bags to us. The blending of plastic will not only give longevity to roads but also reduce plastic in the city,” BBMP Chief Engineer (south zone) S Prabhakar said.
Ahmed Khan of KK Plastic said his firm had tied up with agents who collect plastic from ragpickers. “We have a network of ragpickers, apartments and schools from where we pick plastic. We pay these ragpickers between Rs 6 and Rs 8 for one kilogram of polythene bags,” he said.
Khan said though blending plastic with tar increased the cost by about 2%, the road’s longevity would increase two-fold. BBMP used plastic to asphalt roads for 10 years but stopped it two years.
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