Evaluation of Anti-Aging Effect in Biochar-Modified Bitumen

Clara Celauro (), Rosalia Teresi and Nadka Tz. Dintcheva ()
Additional contact information
Clara Celauro: Dipartimento di Ingegneria, Università Degli Studi di Palermo, Viale delle Scienze, 90128 Palermo, Italy
Rosalia Teresi: Dipartimento di Ingegneria, Università Degli Studi di Palermo, Viale delle Scienze, 90128 Palermo, Italy
Nadka Tz. Dintcheva: Dipartimento di Ingegneria, Università Degli Studi di Palermo, Viale delle Scienze, 90128 Palermo, Italy

Sustainability, 2023, vol. 15, issue 13, 1-16

Abstract: Increasing environmental awareness has led to a great research effort towards the formulation of increasingly sustainable pavements, mainly by developing bituminous mixtures incorporating waste materials. Furthermore, some waste materials have been proved to be useful for enhancing the performance of road bitumen and bituminous products, so their use is a potential solution for ensuring environmental, economic, and also technical benefits. Amongst the different wastes to be used for bitumen modification, a possible one is that obtained via the pyrolysis of biomass, named biochar. In the research reported here, a selected biochar was added to bitumen to verify the possibility of improving bitumen performance in terms of photo-oxidation resistance, which is a major problem in urban areas where black flexible pavements contribute to the urban heat island effect. Different biochar amounts were selected, and two different aging methods were performed: short-term aging and UVB aging resistance; they were monitored using rheological and spectroscopic analysis. The structural changes in bitumen in terms of carbonyl and hydroxyl accumulation were observed at various UV irradiation times. All the experimental data indicate that the use of biochar can have a positive effect on the UV resistance of bitumen, lowering its photo-oxidation tendency. This may lead to reductions in use of natural, non-renewable materials, since intervention maintenance may be scheduled at longer terms.

Keywords: biochar; biochar-modified bitumen; aging performance; short-term aging; rheology; UV irradiation; FTIR analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/13/10583/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/13/10583/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:15:y:2023:i:13:p:10583-:d:1187402

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().