Work is underway on an extension to Toyota’s Derbyshire car manufacturing plant which will allow the firm to store more vehicles on site.
The Japanese car-maker is extending the despatch yard to the rear of the factory at Burnaston, which will allow it to store an extra 3,500 vehicles.
Once complete, the development will help Toyota replace an existing arrangement where vehicles are stored off site.
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The yard, which will cover around 15 acres, is being built on land that is already owned by Toyota, which has been making cars at Burnaston since 1992.
The Burnaston plant produces the Corolla and the majority of the cars it makes are exported. The new despatch yard extension, sited next to the plant's solar farm, will store newly-made cars before they are exported to dealerships across Europe.
Local firm Whitehouse Construction, which is based at Ashbourne, is delivering the project using a revolutionary road construction technique called RoadCem, which was first developed in the Netherlands.
Conventional road construction involves the need to dig out the site to a depth of 3ft and take all of the material away in lorries to landfill. Lorry loads of excavated stone are then driven in to form the base.
However, using the RoadCem system, no material needs to be taken away. Instead, the ground is churned to a depth of 1ft and mixed with synthetic zeolites, flattened, and then goes hard to form the base for the Tarmac to be laid on.
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Toyota estimates that using this technique has eliminated 3,000 lorry journeys in and out of the Burnaston site.
Recently, South Derbyshire MP Heather Wheeler visited the site to see how working on the expansion was progressing.
She said: “We are all too aware of the impact of climate change and the need to protect the environment so I was delighted to be invited to see a revolutionary road construction being used to build a new Derby Hub at the Toyota site in Burnaston.
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“From the very beginning Toyota has sought to be environmentally friendly in every way, so it comes as no surprise that they decided to use this new technology for their expansion.
“Congratulations to Whitehouse Construction for bringing this new product to the 海角视频 and for Toyota for realising the huge impact on climate change that the new way of building roads and car parks can have.
“I was very impressed and will be speaking to ministers about RoadCem. I am sure it is the future of road building and hope to see it rolled out across Derbyshire and the 海角视频.”