Leca® Lightweight Aggregate Turned Circular
Leca® Lightweight Aggregate turned circular when pellets were bought back for reuse from highway E6 in Sweden
At the beginning of the millennium, the highway E6 outside the Swedish city Uddevalla was extended. Leca® Lightweight Aggregate (LWA) was used for parts of the extension of the highway, and the material stayed there until the year 2021.
In connection with maintenance work, the filling with lightweight aggregate would be excavated and removed, as it was no longer needed on site. Leca Sweden was contacted to investigate the possibility of buying back the material.
Circular life cycle instead of linear
Leca Sweden, had at this point in time launched a new concept for buying back old material, going by the name Leca Tur & Retur. The concept makes it possible for companies to sell back material that is no longer, for any reason, needed. The material will then be reused in a future project.
This means that the life cycle of the Leca® LWA does not have to be linear anymore. It can easily instead become a circular lightweight product on the market. Leca Tur & Retur is therefore an important step towards a resource-efficient and sustainable process.
In the event of potential repurchases, one of Leca's technical specialists, in this specific case Ola Andersson, will make an on-site visit. This is to be able to carry out an initial inspection of the material.
Simple product, simple process
The excavation of the old filling went smoothly and without problems. When installing a filling with Leca LWA, the layers are separated with geotextile. This ensures that the filling is stable and held in place. This also make it even more easy to dig it up.
The transport back can be done in different ways. In this case, the excavator could directly fill containers with lightweight aggregate which was then transported back by truck. Another option available is to suck up the material. For this, a vacuum truck is used, which is then allowed to transport the material back again. The bought back Leca LWA is always tested in a lab, despite its durability over time. This is so that the next customer can feel safe and have no doubts regarding the material's properties and values.
Leca LWA, which is made from the completely natural material, is easy to reuse. The material's properties, such as being resistant to frost, chemicals and durable over time, mean that it can lie in the ground for decades. By thinking circularly and resource-efficiently, there are many environmental benefits. And with Leca LWA, it's easy to do.
The material did not have to wait a long time before it got reused. Later the same year the material was reused for a load compensation near a new residential area in Sweden.
