As one of the Netherlands’ leading infrastructure companies, Van Gelder uses Ecochain to measure and improve the environmental footprint of its asphalt mixes.
With Ecochain, the team can compare different material scenarios, make sustainability choices backed by data, and submit tenders with reliable MKI scores.
Video Transcript:
I am Charlotte Boon. I have been working at Van Gelder Aannemingsmaatschappij for four years. My work mainly focuses on making our asphalt mixtures more sustainable and calculating their ECI values for tenders, in order to win those tenders.
In that context, we often use Ecochain Helix, which supports us in calculating these ECI values. It also helps us identify where we can best improve the sustainability of our asphalt mixtures, so that we can increase our chances of winning tenders.
One of the main challenges is achieving a very low ECI value, especially because we see that competitors in our field are also continuously lowering their values.
So you are constantly working on developing mixtures at the composition level to reach the lowest possible score. You also notice that it is increasingly required in tenders to provide this ECI value, in order to make the environmental impact of asphalt transparent.
This is how we continue to make our asphalt more sustainable, and Ecochain helps make this impact measurable and transparent.
Do you have a tip for companies like yours who are facing similar challenges?
Focus on the mixture level and identify where you can achieve the most impact. For asphalt, this is almost always the bitumen. So find a supplier that is actively working on improving the sustainability of bitumen. We work closely with a specific partner to reduce the ECI value of bitumen.
Additionally, using less bitumen results in a better ECI value. So keep continuously improving your asphalt compositions.
