There are a lot of gravel roads in Saskatchewan, and that could be worth money to the province’s canola growers.
Gravel roads produce dust, and depending on the outcome of a pilot project undertaken by the provincial highways department, canola oil could soon be used to keep that dust under control.
“I think the market potential is huge,” said Zenneth Faye, a Foam Lake, Sask., canola grower and executive manager of Milligan Bio-Tech Inc.
Milligan is a Foam Lake company that produces a number of industrial products from canola, including a diesel fuel conditioner, biodiesel and a penetrating oil, from lower quality canola.
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Canola oil has been used in the past as a dust suppressant in the feed industry, which gave Faye the idea that it might also work on gravel roads.
The idea got its first test as part of a high school science project by Faye’s daughter Ambrely, now an engineering student at the University of Saskatchewan, in co-operation with the local rural municipality.
The results showed canola oil is effective, less expensive and longer lasting than calcium chloride, the dust suppressant normally used.
The company approached the provincial highways department, which was interested enough to buy 8,000 litres of the dust suppressant product for a two-year experiment along a stretch of highway near Foam Lake that had recently been turned from asphalt to gravel.
In August the canola-based suppressant was applied to several sections of road, using varying rates of application.
Rob McGregor, plant manager for Milligan, said preliminary results from the first few months of the trial run are encouraging.
“The testing that has been done so far looks very positive,” he said. “It works, and it seems to be holding up very well.”
Officials with the department of highways were unable to comment on the project last week because of rules preventing government employees from speaking to the media during an election campaign.
However, in a News release
news issued before the campaign, the local highways official overseeing the project had mainly complimentary things to say about the product.
Thomas Matt, supervisor of operations for the department’s Leross section, said that applied at a rate of one litre per sq. metre the product coated the gravel to a depth of five centimetres.
The Milligan product also works better in wet weather, since as an oil-based product it repels water, while the calcium chloride combines with water to create a greasy surface.
A big selling point for the canola-based suppressant is that it is biodegradable and lacks the negative environmental impacts of calcium chloride.
Matt said the department is reserving judgment until the two-year test is complete, in order to get as much information as possible about issues such as application rates, how long it lasts, residual effects and cost.
“If it pans out, however, I think we will continue to use it,” he said in the News release
news.
Faye said news of the dust suppressant project has triggered a “tremendous response,” with lots of calls to the company from rural municipalities and towns in Saskatchewan and Alberta.
