When an old city road is scraped up for resurfacing, most people probably do not think about where the chunks of asphalt end up. The material can look like little more than a pile of black rubble waiting to be hauled away. In Los Angeles, however, much of that old pavement was given another life. A U.S. Environmental Protection Agency case study on recycling enterprises documented how Cyclean used microwave technology to turn reclaimed asphalt pavement into new hot-mix asphalt for the city's streets.
The EPA's Manufacturing from Recyclables: 24 Case Studies of Successful Enterprises reported that, over five years, Los Angeles had reduced its use of virgin paving material by more than 800,000 tons, while saving approximately $8 million in materials and disposal costs. The case study described the Cyclean operation as an example of how an existing waste material could become a useful feedstock for a new product.
