COMSA has been awarded a runner-up prize in the first edition of the Catalan Ecodesign Awards for its Neoballast innovation project, designed to improve the properties of railway ballast using a smart coating based on rubber from recycled tyres. The company has received the award in the category of Products in Development (prototype stage), in competition with 55 other candidates.
The award is in recognition of the results obtained in the first pilot tests that have been carried out and which show significant improvement over the properties of conventional ballast in terms of durability and performance (including both dynamic behaviour and also reduction of the noise and vibration produced by circulation on the track).
Neoballast is one of the projects financed by the Innpacto programme of the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness to promote public-private collaboration in R&D&i. The project is led by COMSA and involves the participation of the company Mapei and the Polytechnic University of Catalonia, and the collaboration of GMN.
The presentation of the awards took place on 29 October at a ceremony in Barcelona. The Catalonia Ecodesign Awards are an initiative of the Department of Territory and Sustainability of the Catalan Regional Government, which aims to give recognition to those projects designed to improve the environmental behaviour of products and services during their life cycle.
