a technology has been developed in France that would help transform solid industrial wastes, including rubber and paper, into a material suitable for laying roads. Silica and aluminium, used to make glass, are found in abundance in ashes from wastes. These compounds, melted under a high-temperature plasma torch and cooled, form a solid material.

The material is long-lasting and meets the norms of the French Atomic Energy Commission of safety, according to a study. The test related to the effect of the material on the environment suggests that the process of inter-diffusion, through which basic elements are extracted from the material in exchange for the protons in rain water, become negligible by the time it is exposed to the third rain. If the technology is approved by the government, it may prove to be an ideal method to convert wastes into new materials.