Roads made of recycled printer toner

The City of Sydney is trialling an environmentally friendly asphalt blend - which uses recycled materials including toner from discarded printer cartridges - to resurface sections of road across the city.

The TonerPave asphalt was developed by the City’s road contractor, Downer EDI, in partnership with cartridge recycling company Close the Loop. Sergio Cinerari, Downer’s CEO infrastructure services, explained that the company utilises toner powder, which contains comparable particles to that of asphalt.

“The use of printer toner in the asphalt mix reduces the amount of bitumen, which is derived from crude oil,” Cinerari said.

“We work closely with Close the Loop, who collect and recycle huge quantities of toner cartridges for large printer and copier companies. The cartridges are then shredded for recycling and the toner powder comes to us to be made into TonerPave at our Rosehill plant.”

Andrew Christie, the City’s construction services manager, said the asphalt blend can reduce emissions by 40% compared to conventional asphalt. This is because the mix is “heated at temperatures 20 to 50°C lower than regular asphalt”, he said, meaning it takes less energy to produce.

Not only does the asphalt mix reduce the amount of energy which goes into resurfacing 50,000 m² of City road every year, but it also keeps the printer toner out of landfill. Christie noted, “Landfill sites produce huge amounts of methane, a greenhouse gas with 25 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide.”

Lord Mayor Clover Moore added, “Around 20,000 tonnes of cartridge waste has been recycled in asphalt across Australia since the initiative began in 2012.”