Sustainable Concrete That Lets the Rain Back In

In a February thunderstorm a sealed driveway sheds its water into the gutter within seconds, and the oil and grit go with it. Permcon holds that storm on site. Its slab is 20 to 25 per cent open voids. Rain falls through into a stone base and from there into the soil, where it tops up groundwater rather than loading the drain.

The creek at the bottom of the hill gets less, too. Up to 70 per cent of the heavy metals, hydrocarbons, detritus and suspended solids stays behind in the pavement instead of riding the first flush down the pipe.

One of our roadside bus stops sits inside the tree protection zone of an established canopy tree: 175 mm of Permcon over open stone, with rain and air still reaching the roots underneath. A sealed slab there would have cut those roots off, and trees beside hard paving usually lose that fight. The tree stayed. So did its shade, which on a January afternoon keeps the people waiting there out of the sun. There's more on building around roots on our tree protection zones page.

Permcon is MUSIC certified, which counts for a lot in Queensland. An engineer can drop it into a stormwater model as a treatment element; ask us for the parameters, and see the technical page for storage, infiltration and loading figures.

We hold ISO 14001 for environmental management, and Permcon is Australian made. Permcon is designed to last in excess of 30 years. Larger developments are covered on our commercial properties page.