Revaluetech is now able to supply rail sleepers and bearers made entirely from plastic packaging waste.  These approved and certified polymer composite sleepers have been in use for nearly 14 years in a number of German cities and for the past 3 years in Budapest, Hungary.  

Their use is rapidly expanding in Europe as the they are the only plastic sleepers that have demonstrated credibility, in terms of sustainability and superior whole life performance, directly related to their cost, durability and environmental safety.  Added to these factors is that unlike wood sleepers they are maintenance free and have a predicted service life of at least 50 years.  As of 1st May next year the use of creosote as a preservative for wood sleepers will be banned throughout Europe and therefore the introduction of these inert, long lasting products provide the ideal solution where ballasted track is to be used as part of any metro, urban and light rail project.    

The Technical University of Munich in 2007 certified these sleepers following extensive laboratory and track testing in the city of Dresden. In 2013 further testing and certification was carried out on behalf of rail authorities in Budapest, Hungary, for use in domestic and urban railways.  Copies of these documents are available on request.

The significance to the growing number of metro and light rail projects in the UK is that the use of these sustainable, maintenance free products offers, for the first time, evidence based testing and certification allied to the number of years they have now been in use without fault.  In so doing they clearly provide a way to show that short service life plastic packaging waste can be used in long service life second applications for products that are themselves recyclable after many years of use.

A wide range of polymer composite products made from 100% mixed plastic packaging waste are available via Revaluetech to compliment and support rail infrastructure resilience, in the form of noise barriers, revetments, crib walls, fencing and cable troughs.  

Website:  www.revaluetech.co.uk

 

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