More than 300 representatives of road construction organizations, manufacturers of machinery, equipment and materials, specialists from research organizations and government authorities became participants in the IV Asphalt Concrete 2023 conference in St. Petersburg.
“Events of this level are important, especially at a time when the country’s leadership sets goals of strategic importance for the industry. In his address to the Federal Assembly in February 2023, President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin noted that it is necessary to pay special attention to the quality characteristics of the facilities under construction. Our key task is to bring at least 85% of the roads of the backbone network to the standard state by the end of 2027 using modern materials and equipment, mainly of domestic production, ”Oleg Stupnikov, Deputy Head of Rosavtodor, emphasized in his welcoming speech. He also recalled the need for strict compliance with the requirements of the technical regulations of the Customs Union “Road Safety” and the standards developed to ensure its requirements.
The participants devoted the first day of the conference to discussing the issues of improving the production of asphalt concrete mixes in accordance with modern standards for volumetric-functional design based on the Marshall methodology. This is one of the tasks facing the constituent entities of the Russian Federation in the context of the implementation of the national project “Safe High-Quality Roads”. The next topic was the expansion of the use of secondary resources, in particular, milled asphalt concrete and rubber crumb. The experts outlined the steps that need to be taken to make this technology more widespread. For the first time at the conference, the issue of import substitution was discussed in terms of the wider introduction of domestic equipment and the organization of mass production of asphalt concrete plants in the country. The participants also touched upon the issues of raising the level of education of road sector specialists.
On the second day, the conference participants discussed the issues of import substitution. Manufacturing companies presented reports on, among other things, import substitution in the field of laboratory equipment.
“Given the effect of a large number of progressive new standards, import substitution is a very important task. It is gratifying to note that today more than 95% of the road industry is provided with domestically produced devices,” said Nikolay Bystrov, President of the Association of Producers and Consumers of Asphalt Mixes “R.O.S.ASFALT”, Chairman of the Technical Committee for Standardization No. 418 “Road Facilities” .
In addition, one of the main topics of the second day of the conference was the organization of construction control in the road industry. Vladimir Martinson, Deputy Director of the Department for Quality Assurance of Road Works of FAA ROSDORNII, presented a report on the prospects for the digitalization of construction control.
The participants of the discussion also noted the need for a detailed joint discussion of plans for digitalization and the development of agreed decisions under the auspices of Rosavtodor.
An innovation for the already traditional format of the conference was the “zero” day. For students of four St. Petersburg universities, seven lectures were given by leading experts in the road sector in various areas. It was decided to continue the practice of such cooperation with universities within the framework of the conference in the future.
— Posted by Anna Shishkalova March 03, 2023, 15:29, edited March 03, 2023, 15:29
