The South Carolina Department of Transportation received two awards on Thursday, April 21, 2016, including a top honor for using recycled materials to repair roads.
Both awards were given during the April Commission meeting in Columbia.
The Asphalt Recycling and Reclaiming Association (ARRA) presented the Richard E. Lowell President’s Award to South Carolina Secretary of Transportation Christy A. Hall in recognition of her “outstanding contribution to the asphalt recycling and reclaiming industry, her dedication to the advancement of highway rehabilitation technology, and her boundless commitment to the Asphalt Recycling and Reclaiming Association.”
The Richard E. Lowell President’s Award is presented periodically, at the discretion of the President, to an individual who has, through long term involvement, worked to advance the goals of the Asphalt Recycling & Reclaiming Association and to promote the growth and technological advances of the industry, according to ARRA. It had been awarded twice in the past 10 years.
Secretary Hall said, “I am honored to accept on behalf of the great team of employees we have in place at the South Carolina Department of Transportation.”
AARA President Ryan Essex said SCDOT does more asphalt reclamation than any other state or province in the United States or Canada.
Full depth reclamation is a technique by which failing and worn out road surfaces are repaired by milling the existing asphalt, mixing it with some of the underlying soils and cement and laying it back down to create a new base. By using recycled materials, costs are lower than starting from scratch.
SCDOT has recycled 4 million square yards of asphalt in the past year, and 8 million square yards since 2006. Photos are available at the following link:
According to ARRA, from SCDOT’s first project in 1995, the agency “has progressed to a position of leadership in the use of full-depth recycling for renewal of South Carolina’s aging road network, the fourth-largest state-controlled road network in the United States. In 2015 alone, SCDOT let over 8.7 million square yards of FDR and has let over 20 million square yards in the last six years. Secretary Hall has been a consistently strong supporter and proponent of recycling technology and innovation at SCDOT for many years.”
http://www.scdot-transfer.org/SCDOTPHOTOS/ARRAaward/
Also Thursday, SCDOT received a Perpetual Pavement Award from the Asphalt Pavement Alliance. The award was presented for a 6.53-mile section of I-20 in Lexington County from the Aiken County line to SC Highway 34. “The award honors asphalt pavements that were designed and built with outstanding care and exceptional quality,” according to the award. “The result is a long-lasting pavement, one that serves the traveling public well, provides true value to the taxpayers, and demonstrates both the convenience and the quality of asphalt pavement.”
