Posted on 11/01/2010 5:39:35 PM PDT by decimon
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The team says that mixing common sand – one of the most abundant resources on the planet – with a solution containing the microorganism Bacillus Pasteurii could result in a cementing process that turns the mix into biologically-engineered hardened sandstone.
After the two are mixed, the solution is sprayed on yet another layer of sand. The microbes act again, solidifying the layer underneath, and resulting in a tough, road-worthy material that can sustain heavy traffic.
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(Excerpt) Read more at nextbigfuture.com ...
Hmmm, sounds like one of those things that just because you can do it doesn’t mean you should.
But the bad new is that tires wear out every 5000 miles.
The worst part will be years from now, when leftist professors berate our society for using bacterial coolie labor to build roads.
Bacterium... isn’t that what the call the buffet line for bacteria?
Wouldn’t they need expansion joints?
But the bad new is that tires wear out every 5000 miles.
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As will your lungs so don’t buy any steel-belted radials, I guess.
No, bacteria like very, very small joints.
No blood for sand!
Kinda like the cafeterium at school.
From a quick search it looks like a couple more ingredients are needed. And it looks like bacillus pasteurii is a natural soil microbe.
It's like a septic system where the good bugs eat the bad bugs.
But I think the bottom line is that once the bugs have done their work...they croak.
Sandstone for roads doesn't make a lot of sense....basically, it's the old brick streets like we had in our neighborhood. It's pretty soft and not sure what temperature change does to it...
Concrete roads last a hell of a long time but are expensive and take some real expertise.
Some things work. Some don't. Might be okay for a coutry road without a lot of traffic...SHOW ME!!
Mytosis, your tosis, everybody’s tosis.
The animal rights activists will scream and wail about the unfairness to the poor little bacilli. Mixing them with sand, then squishing them with truck wheels- really!
Well, it was a pretty good ground cover. Unfortunately it was an even better house cover, power pole cover, road cover, and if you stood still for a little too long, people cover.
That’s really cool, but my understanding is that asphalt is pretty much a useless byproduct of oil refinement, no?
( I mean useless for fuel, of course.)
bflr
bflr
My first question: Is this cheaper than asphalt roads? Here in Sonoma County, we’ve just been informed that the County supervisors are going to let most of our country roads go to wrack and ruin because we can’t afford to maintain them. Seriously, they’re going to let the present asphalt roads “degrade” to cobblestone-sized pieces (which will take about ten years, and guess how much FUN it’s going to be driving on these POS roads during that time?), and then they’re going to pulverize the pieces and turn them back into gravel-type roads. Progress, my @ss. Maybe we’ll have sandstone roads in place before this “plan” of their can come to pass. One can hope.
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