Recycling reclaimed asphalt pavement fulfills an important function in achieving a sustainable and environmentally friendly road construction industry. Using reclaimed asphalt pavement (RAP) it is possible to produce new asphalt with a small amount of virgin raw materials. This will reduce the amount of energy required to extract and process virgin asphalt pavement materials, along with the amount of waste generated during road reconstruction. Despite these advantages, road agencies have been reluctant to use high proportions of RAP materials in new asphalt production because the presence of large amounts of oxidized bitumen from RAP in new mixtures makes them less workable and less compactable than mixtures with virgin bitumen alone. One should also be aware of the high stiffness of RAP mixtures, which will make them difficult to use. Various methods can be used to overcome this problem, one of the most effective is the addition of rejuvenating agents. This article describes research into the production of asphalt mixtures from recycled asphalt pavement (RAP) material. This work aims to study the effectiveness of various rejuvenators for restoring the basic performance characteristics of asphalt pavements. The most effective rejuvenators and their classification are reviewed. The hypothesized mechanism of rejuvenation of asphalt pavements by the introduction of rejuvenators is presented. The methods of introducing various rejuvenators into RAP are described.
Read full abstract