Road resurfaced using 107,000 dirty nappies in barmy sustainability drive

A stretch of road has been resurfaced using thousands of dirty nappies in a new sustainability initiative.

The 1.4-mile stretch of the A487 between Cardigan and Aberystwyth in Wales will open this week with a new surface consisting of more than 107,000 used nappies as part of a new initiative ran between baby care business Pura and nappy recycling experts NappiCycle.

The initiative, supported by the Welsh Government, will use some of the three billion nappies are disposed of in the UK each year, Wales Online reports.

For the road resurfacing project, a total of 4.3 tonnes of recovered fibre from the nappies was added to the bitumen that glued together with asphalt road surfaces.

The “nappy-enhanced” asphalt is even more durable than standard asphalt, but with a reduced carbon footprint.

Rob Poyer, the founder of NappiCycle, developed the process in 2009. Used nappies are cleaned, and plastics and cellulose fibres are separated for re-use. 100% of the soiled nappies are processed, so nothing is sent to landfill – even the urine extracted from the nappies is re-utilised.

The recovered cellulose can be re-purposed not just for road surfacing, but for notice boards for schools and offices, panelling, under laminate flooring and other insulation. The service is currently only available to parents in Wales, where it is funded by local authorities.

Baby care brand Pura teamed up with NappiCycle in 2020. Founder Guy Fennell wanted a more circular solution for wipes and nappy waste. Since forming the partnership, Guy has frequently addressed politicians about the environmental problems posed by nappy waste, earning him the mantle “The Nappy Guy”.

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The scheme already prevents more than 800,000 nappies from being sent to landfills in Wales every single week. Guy’s mission is to bring nappy recycling to the entire UK, starting with a nappy recycling trial in Bristol which is set to launch in the coming months.

Rob Poyer, the NappiCycle founder, added: “This type of road surface material has huge potential for producing more sustainable roadways with a lower carbon impact.

"With this trial, we hope to demonstrate that waste nappies could be widely adopted in our roads, not just here in Wales, but right around the UK.”

UK landfill sites see 400,000 tonnes of nappy waste each year – most of which can take up to 500 years to break down.

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