Don’t miss this opportunity to submit a presentation idea for the South Carolina Asphalt Pavement Association’s 2024 Winter Conference & Trade Show! To submit a topic, please fill out the short form below. 

In order to ensure we have the highest quality presentations and speakers, we are seeking volunteers to serve on the 2024 SCAPA Winter Conference Planning Committee. We have scheduled our annual planning meeting for Tuesday, Aug. 29 from 10-2 p.m. We will meet on this day to develop the Winter Conference Technical Program Agenda.

The meeting will be held at the SCDOT ITS Building located behind the Office of Materials and Research at 1408 Shop Road, Columbia, South Carolina. Lunch will be provided.

Please send an email to cliff@scasphalt.org or call 803-252-2522. Volunteers are eligible for discounted SCAPA Winter Conference registration fees. 

Next month, young professionals from SCAPA's contractor and associate members are invited to join SCAPA PAVE Committee Members on August 29 at 4:30 p.m. at Tradesman Brewing at the Young Leaders Connect Event. Registration for this networking event can be found in the "Learn More" link below.

Promo Codes
CAGC Members: SCAPAYL
Non-CAGC Members: SCAPAMEMBER

SCAPA is proud to announce a partnership with Women of Asphalt to start a new branch in South Carolina.Women of Asphalt is a national coalition which supports women in all aspects of the asphalt industry through mentoring, education, and advocacy and by encouraging women to seek careers in the asphalt industry.
The Steering Committee for the new SC Branch is hosting an information session on Zoom on Tuesday, Sept 19th at 1 PM.  Click the link below to register for this virtual event. We encourage all of our members to join in next month.

Special thanks to the Women of Asphalt South Carolina Branch Steering Committee members:

Noelle Arena, Pacific GeoSource/Forta Group
Keela Ardis, Palmetto Corp. 
Ashley Batson, Esq., Ingevity
Susan Dukes Snyder, SC DOT
Emily Holbert, MA, Reeves Construction Company
Brigetta Laird, Southeast Emulsions
Kimmie Lyons, PhD, SC DOT

If you have not been in the SCAPA Member Portal lately, you may not have seen the new look! We would like for the Member Portal to be a resource for you and hope to add more members-only content to it. You can get to the Member Portal from the new website at www.scasphalt.org and click "Member Login" from the menu. Click below to learn more about why you need to be on the Member Portal.

Hard copies of the 2023 SCAPA Membership Directory & Resource Guide are still available! Copies were shipped out in March. To access the digital version, please click the "Learn More" button below.

Please let Jayson or Cliff know if you have not received a copy or would like a complimentary one mailed or delivered to you.

In review of the biggest topics, trends, and agendas coming out of the midyear meeting: What is on the horizon for the association? What are its priorities? The halfway chapter of 2023 has officially closed for the asphalt industry, as the National Asphalt Pavement Association’s (NAPA) July conference in Kansas City, MO, came to an end. The midwestern city was a beautiful backdrop and generous host for the gathering, even if those who ventured outside were greeted with both heat and air quality advisories. However, for those of us in town for NAPA, most of the time was spent in session or committee meetings hearing about these big topics. How is the industry evolving into the future?

Source: For Construction Pros
The fusion of asphalt and waste plastic presents a complex scenario. Asphalt stands as the most recycled item in the U.S., with substantial unused reclaimed asphalt pavements (RAP) due to regulatory limitations. Technological and design advancements, including chemical rejuvenation, are bridging the gap between virgin and RAP mixes. Notably, Green Asphalt in New York achieves 100% RAP utilization. Conversely, the challenges of incorporating plastic persist.

Source: Hey NAPA
"What asphalt pavement questions can I answer for you?" Ask Hey NAPA!
Using Artifical Intelligence (AI), this software can be used to provide answers to your questions with the assistance of hundreds of NAPA publications that have a broad general knowledge of asphalt pavement topics. Ask Hey NAPA anything that you'd like and this program will do its best to provide a concise answer and point you to additional resources. See the link below to ask your question.

The White House recently offered final guidance on Build America, Buy America. We've got the latest here for you!

Source: SCFOR
On Tuesday, August 8th, Spartanburg County Council gave the green light for a third and final reading of an ordinance giving locals a say in November about whether they want to fund road improvements with a continuation of the county’s capital project sales tax (CPST). Back in 2017, the CPST funded a new courthouse and more, expiring in April 2024. If November's vote passes, the tax rate stays at 7% until 2030, solely to be used for better roads, bridges, and intersections. About $478 million could be generated for county projects. See the link below for more information.

For Construction Pros
Harsh Words For “Buy American”
Graves gave negative feedback on the current administration’s “Buy American” policy, stating that it is neither possible nor reasonable to expect the construction industry to domestically source all their materials. He further critiqued the policy as lacking “clarity” on what exactly constitutes a qualifying item. 
As reported by For Construction Pros:
"Elam brought up the subject of the Federal Highway Trust Fund’s pending insolvency, and its repeated reliance on general fund transfers. The conversation veered towards the political impossibility of raising the gas tax (not done since 1993), the increased number of electric vehicles (EV) on the road, and the potential for a vehicle miles traveled (VMT) system of taxation."
Click the link to read the full article.

35 states are planning to implement EPDs for Sustainable Project Delivery under FHWA’s latest iteration of the Every Day Counts (EDC) initiative. According to the EDC-7 Baseline Report, 19 of these states have set a goal to demonstrate, assess, or institutionalize EPDs, compared to the current total of three states that have reached this level of deployment. For more information, check out the EPDs for Sustainable Project Delivery website and visit NAPA’s EPD program website.

Source: FHWA/DOT
FHWA has published a long-awaited report: Pavement Resilience: State of the Practice. The article delves into climate pressures affecting pavements, including heavier rainfall, floods, dry spells, and wildfires. It also considers rising sea levels and permafrost shifts. For each challenge, it offers ideas to adapt materials, pavement design, construction, and agency practices. Additionally, the report highlights insights from two peer discussions held in 2020.
See the link below for more information.

Bridging the gap between despair and professional care through peer-to-peer interactions.
Host Dom Cooper (Wife of QC Manager Scott Cooper at Sanders Brothers) would like to offer a steppingstone to men to actively seek therapeutic help since men are at the highest risk of suicide. Guest speakers will provide hope to those who have given up on life because mental pain seems too great through their own stories of hard ships. The goal is to create a community that offers hope in breaking the stigma of men's unwritten rules of not being able to talk about ther emotions. She aims to show that no matter how painful or defined a man's upbringing is, emotional conversations can bring healing and self-awareness. Please click on the link below for more information on this important seminar being held on Saturday, September 23 from 12 - 2PM.

SCAPA is honoring its commitment to this important topic and will continue to include this article for several months to give everyone a chance to read and act by including this into your life and your company's safety programs.

The 2023 SCDOT certification course schedule has been released. Online registration is available on TCTC's website at www.tctc.edu/scdot.

Note that the site will have only one of each course type available for registration at a time, so not all of the sections will show as available. 

Bond Strength is a goal that we all want to achieve when selecting different materials and designing asphalt mixtures.The Cohesion can be determined by the chemical components of asphalt binders and the interactions of molecules. Adhesion failure is due to the separation of the asphalt coating from the aggregate, which occurs at the interfacial zone (which is the reason for wanting clean-washed materials).