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news
Toilet roll (CC licensed by Quinn Dombrowski via Flickr).jpgBike path in Netherlands made using recycled toilet paper
The Dutch province of Friesland has made use of recycled toilet paper to pave a cycle path. The 1km stretch connecting the Frisian capital of Leeuwarden to the town of Stiens was laid last year and is reportedly withstanding wear and tear every bit as well as surrounding stretches.
Citylab reports that paper fibre is sifted out of waste water by a 0.35 millimetre industrial sieve. It then goes through a series of machines which clean, sterilise, bleach and dry it. You are left with what is known as tertiary cellulose.
“If you look at it, you would not expect it to have originated from wastewater,” said Chris Reijken, a wastewater treatment advisor at Waternet, a Netherlands water authority. “You can touch it, you can use it. It’s no problem.”
Dutch asphalt is porous to deal with heavy rainfall and this requires more bitumen in the mix. Tertiary cellulose can be added to thicken the mixture and keep the bitumen from dripping off the aggregate.
Water authorities can apparently pay 180 euros a ton to transport waste sludge to an incinerator, so there is great interest in actually making use of a portion of it.
“It’s a strange idea for people that there’s [toilet paper] in the road,” said Michiel Schrier, provincial governor of Friesland. “But when they cycle on it or feel it, they can see that it’s normal asphalt.”
Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn't especially like cake.
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24 comments
This project would be a lot easier to arrange in Greece, where spent toilet paper is placed in a bin rather than flushed
Seriously?! That's grim. Emptying the bins must be as glamorous a job as emptying dog poo bins over here...
So when I buy bog paper marked as "recycled" then I am getting the real deal?
Oh and I use real animals, not fake ones printed on paper.
Not sure what the cost of disposal of sludge has to do with recycling of loo roll as they are different things.
But I am wondering how the separate everything else people flush but shouldn't from the paper before recycling.
I would speculate that in the Netherlands, unlike the U.K., people generally have less difficulty following simple instructions.
If you are paying to dispose of sludge, and 20% is bog roll then recycling the paper has just saved you 20%
If paper doesn't constitute sludge, it'll still have a cost to dispose of and a need to be separated.
There is mention of a 35 micron filter but I expect the sludge goes through a series of decreasing size filters to extract all the glass eyes, false teeth and iPhones beforehand.
I have passed some large stools in my time, but to the best of my knowledge have never crapped out a glass eye or false teeth. What on earth do you eat Johnnystorm?
Anyway, I think in the Netherlands the normal practise is to use ones left hand to wipe, and then clean the fingers on a piece of tissue paper. Thereby keeping the paper reasonaby dry and easily retained in the paper recycling receptacle. In motorway service stations in the UK you often see piles of paper in the corner of the cubicle, usually indicating that a Dutchman was the last occupant.
The main animal visitors I get to the garden are hedgehogs, after the first few attempts I went back to paper...
I scrolled down to the comments expecting jokes about about crap infrastructure, but got an insight into how many people on here have OCD.
Not OCD, just precision bog roll hanging. Should you buy a premium brand you will know you have done it correctly as the embossed animals will be the correct way up.
Pah! Embossed animals? Nowt wrong wi' squares of old newspaper stuck on a nail (Daily Fail by preference)
I'm sorry but I can't get beyond the photo with the loo roll hanging the wrong way around.
well, if you're gonna recycle it, you need to use both sides!
I try and try to explain this to the missus...
my folks hang theirs that way - when I was about 10, I went to grab a piece and a large spider was lurking on the back of the loo roll against the wall, which promptly ran along my arm, down my back, and across my bare arse...
this story is my gift to you
Thanks, I'm already cherishing it.
But an interjection is necessary - the photograph, you uncouth bunch, of course displays the lavatory tissue in its right and proper situation.
Besides, think of the extra several cubic centimetres of space to be gained by keeping the tissue against the wall, and not having it rudely intruding upon your closet.
well, now I'm full grown and have a bathroom of my own, I eschew holders and, in the name of all that is anarchic, have my bog roll free standing
oh the extra space - the freedom!!!
Well now, beezus fufoon, if that is your real name - rayfuckingpurchase - where might you place said 'bog roll' such that it stands free?
haha - it lives on top of the cistern, so you do have to be quite flexible to reach it - which I count as my daily yoga practice - two birds, one stone.
"You can touch it, you can use it. It's no problem", says a spokesman. The thing is, someone else has already touched it and already used it. That makes it a problem.
Those drainage channel perforations every 10 feet are a bit annoying too
I rode along this path yesterday. I thought it was a bit crap to be honest
covered in skid marks too
brilliant! - it's porous, doesn't need to bear 10 tonne loads, doesn't need unecessarily hazardous kerbs - I bet it doesn't cost them £2 million a metre either.