The Investigation of Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) Emissions in Environmentally Friendly Modified Asphalt

Asphalt pavements are increasingly used in road engineering; however, the release of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) from asphalt can harm the environment and humans. In this study, different types of modifiers are added to 70# virgin asphalt to prepare environmentally friendly modified asphalt, and its performance is analyzed. Through the self-designed simple asphalt heating-emission collection and detection device, the inhibition effect of different types of modifier combinations on VOCs in the asphalt emmissions was explored. Then, VOCs emission curves of modified asphalt at different temperatures were studied, and finally the basic physical properties of the environmentally friendly modified asphalt were tested. The test results showed that the optimal modifier combination was 5% activated carbon and 3% surfactant, in which the VOCs and the peak value of asphalt heating emissions were only 1385 min·ppm and 86 ppm, respectively, which represented the best VOCs suppression effect of other groups. At the same time, the modified asphalt with optimal additives improved the high-temperature performance of 70# base asphalt and did not affect the storage stability.