CertainTeed Roofing Corp.’s plant in Avery, Ohio, is using recycled shingle waste in a road improvement project right outside the plant gate. The widening of State Route 250 began earlier this year after the facility partnered with a local paving contractor. Avery has been recycling its shingle waste since the early 1990s, but the first company the plant contracted with was unable to get the go-ahead from the Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT).

“After several years spent seeking economical ways to process the shingle waste, S.E. Johnson signed a year-long contract with us in August 1999,” says Cindy Rents, Avery’s purchasing agent. Nearly 16,000 tons of recycled shingle waste will be used before the widening of the road is completed next fall. “Handling shingle waste in this way cuts our disposal costs by about 50 percent,” Rentz says. “And the material would have to be land-filled if it weren’t being recycled.” In the paving process, sieved shingle waste is added in combination with or instead or RAP (recycled asphalt pavement) to a blend of asphalt, stone, and sand. The blend is then laid down on a prepared rolled stone bed, leveled and smoothed with a highway construction roller.