The sustainable performance challenge of asphalt mixture using polypropylene due to environmental weather

Virgin Polypropylene (PP) has been widely used as polymer additive to modify asphalt concrete mixtures. An attempt to reduce plastic waste including waste PP is to use it to modify concrete asphalt mixtures. In an effort to develop the use of PP waste, this study designed a concrete asphalt mixture using petroleum bitumen as the main binding material and modified it with PP waste to produce concrete asphalt that has good resistance to environmental weather impact. Indirect Tensile Stiffness Modulus (ITSM) value is one of the main characteristics of the asphalt mixture design which represents the characteristics of the stiffness of the asphalt concrete mixture in elastic conditions when it receives a load that produces tensile stress on the asphalt concrete layer. The relationship between temperature and ITSM value of concrete asphalt used to determine the effect of environmental weather on the stiffness properties of the asphalt concrete mixture made with petroleum bitumen and waste PP. ITSM values obtained from the test results show that modification by using waste PP in concrete asphalt mixes using petroleum bitumen as the main binder produced a slightly stiffer mixture without negative effect on mixture.