BASF offers tech to fight waterlogging
A form of pavement capable of instantly allowing huge amounts of water to seep inside is now being offered in Bangladesh by German chemical company BASF.
“Elastopave” uses specific mixes and layers of rock, stone and gravel with polyurethane to yield a strong, water- and air-permeable surface having many interconnected voids and a high degree of porosity, the company said.
Given suitably absorbent ground, rainwater can percolate effectively and replenish aquifers, it adds.
Waterlogging during monsoons is a nagging problem in urban life. Most canals in the country’s major cities have been grabbed by encroachers or are clogged with solid waste, for which rain of even short periods of time leads to whole areas being submerged. Launched in the global market in 2016, Elastopave does not use sand and cement, BASF Bangladesh’s Chairman and Managing Director Md Sazzadul Hassan told The Daily Star.
With Elastopave, each square-feet costs Tk 90 to Tk 95, higher than what it takes for conventional pavements, but the end product lasts over 20 years without repairs, he said.
Hassan said Elastopave is an ideal choice for parks, car parking spaces, cycle lanes, driveways and pavements and is widely used in transport infrastructure and bridges.
He said they were keen to help city corporations solve waterlogging problems while alongside helping the water supplying authority ensure that groundwater levels never go down.
Elastopave is easy to process and can be flexibly varied to blend into immediate surroundings and has already been used in two parks in the capital -- one at Tajmahal Road in Mohamamdpur and the other in Gulshan, he said.
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