This may be the end of potholes as we know them

Everybody knows the sorry condition of many of Washington state’s highways, but we’re not alone. The problem is that over time, all concrete starts to crack. After 20 to 30 years, if it isn’t maintained, it will develop potholes.

You’d think that in an age of smartphones and self-driving cars someone could come up with a smarter concrete. It turns out someone has &#8212 several people, actually.

One of them is Victor Li at the University of Michigan. He says concrete can actually heal itself if you give it a little help.

His secret is to mix in flexible fibers to create what he calls bendable concrete.

“This new concrete, because of the modification in the ingredients, results in a material that distributes the large crack into a lot of minute cracks that can undergo healing,” Li said.

It turns out concrete can heal itself as long as you can keep the cracks small &#8212 as in a fraction of the width of a human hair. That’s just enough to expose uncured concrete particles to rainwater, which then cures the newly-exposed concrete and fills the crack.

That means no noticeable cracks and no potholes.

Of course there’s always a catch, and in this case, it’s the cost.

“At the moment, some versions range between maybe two and five times the cost of normal concrete,” Li said.

But Li says that since it makes re-paving unnecessary, bendable concrete actually saves money over time.

Li’s concrete is not the only self-healing system.

There is also a crack-proof concrete that uses bacteria. It was invented by Dutch microbiologist Henk Jonkers, who was interviewed by CNN.

“You need bacteria that can survive the harsh environment of concrete, but also to make them produce repair material for the concrete,” Jonkers told CNN. “That is limestone.”

Yes, he embeds the concrete with micro-capsules of bacteria that are able to produce limestone. When the concrete cracks, the bacteria is exposed to the rain.

“Water gets in and the water activates the bacteria and starts to make limestone,” Jonkers said. “So the active bacteria makes limestone and the limestone fills up the cracks. That makes the concrete more durable and extends the surface lifetime.”

The limestone also seals the concrete so the water can’t get to the steel rebar, which would rust and cause the concrete to fail.

This bacteria is also a lot more expensive than traditional concrete, but Jonkers says it would mean that highways and buildings could last 200 years. Which coincidentally, is about how long it takes to adopt a long-range transportation budget in Washington state.