Asphalt Re-Lay

I found this company and I knew right away that I had to share it.  Asphalt Re-Lay is a company in Ireland that has found a new way to recycle asphalt pavement and repair potholes in less than 15 minutes.  They use an infrared heater to, for all means, re-melt the aged asphalt binder in the pavement, making the asphalt workable just like it was when it was first made. 



This is something that I could really see taking off, and not just for pothole repair.  If they can figure out a way to re-engineer this technology to turn entire highways into workable material in hours... our tax payers will be saving a ton of money and to be honest... some of us might be out of a job.  Yes, we already recycle a large amount of our highways in California by grinding them up and making them into base rock and putting some of it into new asphalt products but this type of technology will eliminate the cost of grinding the pavement up, loading it into trucks, shipping it to a plant where it is reprocessed and shipped back out onto a job. 

Think about the savings!  Their website is http://www.asphaltrelay.ie/.

I wonder how the compaction is on the reworked pavement when they are through with it.  They are using a relatively small roller which can lead to poor compaction.  Normally, roads should be compacted to around 95% and the bigger the roller the easier it is before the asphalt gets hard again.  Sometimes it's difficult to get compaction even if you have ample time just because you don't have enough weight on the roller.  However, since they are heating the asphalt there on site I bet that they have a lot longer to work on it than a highway crew who gets the asphalt delivered to them considerably cooler than when it was made. 

If you know anything about this product I'm extremely interested in learning more about it and whether they are planning to expand to the United States any time soon.