# What are the emissions from thermoplastic road marking?

Canonical: https://senseible.earth/answers/road-marking-thermoplastic-paint-emissions

Thermoplastic paint is melted in kettles, usually fired by LPG, then laid hot. The LPG is Scope 1 for the marking contractor. The paint itself, resin, glass beads and pigment, is Scope 3. Record LPG and kilograms of paint per km of marking.

## Count

- LPG for melting kettles.
- Diesel for the marking truck.
- Kilograms of thermoplastic and glass beads laid.

## For highway agencies

Marking is small next to bitumen and aggregates, but it recurs every few years, so it adds up over a road's life.

## What Senseible does here

Senseible reads bills, fuel invoices and production records into dated, fingerprinted records, so the figure you send a buyer can be traced to its documents.

- [Bitumen road per km](https://senseible.earth/answers/bitumen-road-carbon-footprint-per-km)
- [19 kg LPG cylinder](https://senseible.earth/answers/lpg-19-kg-cylinder-co2)

Sources: [GHG Protocol Corporate Standard](https://ghgprotocol.org/corporate-standard), [GHG Protocol Corporate Value Chain (Scope 3) Standard](https://ghgprotocol.org/corporate-value-chain-scope-3-standard)

Last reviewed 2026-10-22.