PORTALJABAR, DISTRICT. GARUT - Regional Secretary (Sekda) of Garut Regency, Nurdin Yana, inaugurated 50 KM of Plastic Asphalt Road in collaboration with PT Chandra Asri, which is located in the Simpang Lima area, Tarogong Kidul District, Garut Regency, Thursday (7/3/2024).

The Garut Regional Secretary revealed that for a long time the Garut Regency Regional Government (Pemdakab) had collaborated with PT. Chandra Asri, regarding the use of plastic asphalt for road construction.

According to Nurdin, this is very good to do considering that waste production in Garut Regency is very large.

"I think the very positive thing about this process is that first it concerns the issue of using plastic waste, where the plastic connotation is our problem, because today we are producing almost 100 tonnes per day," said Nurdin.

Nurdin explained, if this continues to be done, Garut Regency can reduce the amount of waste it has. He added that he estimates that if one ton of waste is converted into plastic for 3-4 km of road, a lot of waste will be reduced.

Apart from reducing waste, added Nurdin, the use of plastic asphalt will also increase the strength of the asphalt by around 40% so that it can last longer than normal asphalt.

He explained that currently there are things that need to be paid attention to regarding the waste bank mechanism, where the public will be asked to sort waste starting from non-plastic, plastic and others.

"That's why yesterday we also asked (Bakti) Barito for this use so that they could initiate it and also initiate the existence of a waste bank which today is still spread in a conceptual way," said Nurdin.

In the same place, Chandra Asri's Circular Economy & Partnership Manager, Nicko Setyabudi, revealed that the use of plastic asphalt stems from quite good research from the Ministry of Public Works and Spatial Planning (PUPR).

Therefore, his party took the initiative to try to build roads using plastic asphalt along 100 km with various partners over the last 5 years.

"Garut is one of the partners whose commitment is extraordinary, it is committed to carrying out a 50 km deployment in 2 years and the results can already be seen in the field," he said.

In line with the Garut Regional Secretary, according to Nicko, based on research by the Indonesian PUPR Ministry, it was stated that road stability was 40% percent, which had an impact on the service life of the road itself.

"But it should be noted that the durability of the road is influenced by the design of the road itself, it must be supported by infrastructure on the right and left, there are good culverts and so on, this will maximize the function of the asphalt," he said.

He added that 50 KM of roads in Garut Regency will be built using plastic asphalt spread at several points. Based on directions from the Indonesian PUPR Ministry, the use of plastic asphalt is intended for urban roads, not toll roads, because it has different specifications.

"So more or less according to the PUPR instructions, 4 to 6 percent of the asphalt used for roads is used. So this means that if we make a rough simulation, in one ton of asphalt mixture there is approximately 3 kg of plastic waste from plastic bags," he continued.

Apart from that, the Head of the Garut Regency Public Works and Spatial Planning (PUPR) Department, Agus Ismail, underlined that the use of plastic asphalt uses a type of plastic which has often been overlooked.

"But plastic waste, plastic waste, is considered the cheapest so it doesn't get much attention for recycling, so these are two things that it's time for us to continue to encourage," he said.

Even so, added Agis, through the use of plastic asphalt there are additional costs or costs for each asphalt production used.

"What we are (encouraging) is how this collaboration will be multi-sectoral (related to) environmental management, it's just how far the waste collecting community is that LH can develop with the waste bank," he said. (Diskominfo Garut/Revo)