Best in Road & Bridge Construction

Bennie Greyling

Managing Director | AECI Much Asphalt

Flexibility and innovation

Quality assurance is a key differentiator in the competitive asphalt and bitumen segments, as is innovation, says Bennie Greyling, managing director, AECI Much Asphalt. Here he responds to questions on market opportunities, capabilities and developments.

How is AECI Much Asphalt responding to opportunities?

BG Obviously, the last 12 months have been very tough, but we have managed to maintain our capacity in terms of people and production. We have 16 static and four mobile asphalt plants in Southern Africa, as well as three binder manufacturing facilities.

Do you have solutions for labourintensive construction?

Our hot and cold asphalt products can be used for pothole repair and small-scale surfacing, and we also have modified bitumen products for use in slurry seals, chip seals and crack sealing products.

What is the strategy for the lowvolume roads market?

Our range includes products such as Sand Mix and Micro Surfacing, which are designed for low-volume roads, residential streets and walkways. These products can be manufactured using local materials and offer cost-effective alternatives to conventional asphalt roads. We also offer modified bitumen products for use with slurry seals, and excellent dust suppression solutions through our subsidiary, AECI SprayPave.

What assistance is provided in terms of SMME contractor development?

Our free SMME workshops in the use of hotmix asphalt – covering topics from pothole repair to machine application – are well known and respected in the industry. They attract large numbers of delegates. This is important to ensure the sustainability of asphalt pavements in South Africa. We also provide training in general business and basic financial administration.

As part of our adjusted procurement policy, we settle debt with SMMEs earlier than normal business practices to assist them in improving cash flow and strengthening working capital. Our BBBEE Level 1 status attests to our commitment to supporting SMMEs and industry transformation.

Just-in-time (JIT) delivery of your products is key. What sets AECI Much Asphalt apart?

Due to the unreliable supply of some key resources, we have invested in our own storage capacity. While this practice goes against the JIT principle, it ensures that our customers’ contracts are serviced without interruption. In line with this strategy, AECI SprayPave operates the only multistage bitumen converter on the African continent capable of supplying multiple grades of bitumen in smaller quantities than is financially viable for oil refineries.

Please expand on your current supply projects.

Our Cape Town production facilities in Eerste River and Contermanskloof are supplying a rubber modified asphalt to the R44 between Stellenbosch and Somerset West. In KwaZulu-Natal, current projects include the P338 between Camperdown and Thornville, supplied from our Pietermaritzburg plant, as well as the Bravo Taxiway project at King Shaka International Airport and various bus rapid transit work packages on the Inanda arterial supplied from Coedmore.

Projects supplied from our Inland Region plants include the rehabilitation of the N4 near eMalahleni, the rehabilitation and upgrade of the N3 in Villiers, Free State, and a three-year supply of hot and cold asphalt to the Johannesburg Roads Agency.

What is AECI Much Asphalt’s policy on quality assurance?

Our Central Laboratory in Cape Town holds ISO 17025:2017 accreditation and our Gauteng regional laboratory is expected to follow suit later this year. We intend to include the bitumen performance grade tests, as well as some of the asphalt performance tests in our already extended scope of accredited tests.

All AECI Much Asphalt and AECI SprayPave plants have their own dedicated process control laboratories. These laboratories assure the quality of all products leaving the plants and form part of our commitment to our ISO 9001:2015 quality certification.

www.muchasphalt.com

A hand-laid hot asphalt workshop in progress at AECI Much Asphalt’s Roodepoort branch. This included input by AECI SprayPave on primes and emulsions