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The rubber compounding arm of the HEXPOL Group has announced an investment in a devulcanization line in Europe. This allows them to offer mechanical devulcanization of rubber in-house and supports the transition to a circular economy. For years, HEXPOL Compounding has worked on using cured compound scrap and waste, which are unavoidable side products of rubber part production. In the past, the converter paid for the disposal of their rubber waste, which often ended in landfills or was incinerated. In some cases, rubber waste was ground and reused, but until now, it was mainly used as a filler in low-quality applications. Devulcanization offers an opportunity to keep these valuable resources in circulation and reduce the demand for virgin materials and thus decrease the amount of unused scrap.

Since it was founded in 1962, Maris, a manufacturer of co-rotating twin-screw extruders, has claimed one of the leading positions in the research of new state-of-the-art applications for its products. With the aim of providing its customers with the widest range of choices, every mechanical component of Maris’ extruders are entirely in-house manufactured. Maris says it’s one of the few companies in the world able to <b>customize its co-rotating twin-screw extruders according to its customers’ specific needs and this is true also when it comes to rubber devulcanization</b>. Rubber devulcanization is a selective breaking process of an elastomer S-S and C-S bonds, which produces only a limited degradation of the polymeric structure (C-C bond).

ICARBON, a start-up company established with the support of the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TÜBİTAK), is an R&D company that focuses on the development of technologies that will enable the sustainable recycling of industrial waste rubbers and formulation studies for their compounding

Maris Corp. – an Italian innovator in the field of end-of-life tire rubber devulcanization – reports that the use of devulcanized rubber produced with its patented process and mixed with virgin rubber allows reducing the environmental impact of CO₂ and the consumption of fossil resources. Recently, Maris team – Bruno Muscato and Marco Girotto – collaborating with colleagues from the University of Turin published an article on this matter in Science Direct's Journal of Cleaner Production. The article is headlined as “Environmental assessment of rubber recycling through an innovative thermo-mechanical devulcanization process using a co-rotating twin-screw extruder.”

Phoenix Innovation Technology works with world class rubber labs and research institutions that have validated its Regenerated Rubber in several high-volume technical compounds. These compounds include: OTR, Agricultural and Semi Truck tire tread compounds as well as industrial rubber compounds such as conveyor belts and anti-vibration engine mounts, and various EPDM applications. Phoenix Innovations highlights that Regenerated Rubber is high quality and delivers consistent performance that is optimized for the specific application. For compounders and manufacturers, using Regenerated Rubber is an opportunity to save on raw material costs and improve sustainability.

Engineers and scientists all over the world are challenged by the waste problem on horizon. An engineer who claims to have a solution is Michael Vainer, inventor and founder of Polymeric Powders Company. According to the magazine, he has been trying to develop solutions for tire waste for more than a decade and a half. New rubber devulcanization technology Michael Vainer is an engineer looking at how to solve end-of-life tire problem. While Vainer’s company website reveals few details, he is known to have conducted a lot of research and holding many patents. Vainer company Polymeric Powders’ process takes in raw materials from tire shredders, applies thermal processing followed by a cracking process, then combines the resulting powders with common plastics. The resulting composite material is provided as masterbatch pellets for injection molding or extrusion, or as filament for 3D printing.

An award-winning innovation method for tire recycling is crumb rubber devulcanization. The original process was developed by a scholar whose innovation was commercialized by Tyromer Inc. – the Canadian company founded by a national university. What makes devulcanization stand out is the fact that it does not require the application of any chemical solvents. Moreover, Tyromer’s process helps reuse waste tire rubber in new tires and in retreads – this was hardly possible before.

According to Global Rubber Markets, an online magazine devoted to virgin and recycled rubber, a tire processing plant is expected to be constructed in Scotland. The project, reportedly, is the first of its kind in the UK, and it is expected to solve Scotland’s end-of-life tire problem and create over 100 jobs for the local area. A notice of pre-application has been submitted to Renfrewshire council, informing planners of the intent to build a ground-breaking tire processing plant in Linwood (Renfrewshire), Scotland.

Evonik wants to help make rubber materials from scrap tires easier to re-use in the manufacture of new automobile tires. So far, the suitability of recycled rubber has been very limited because its chemical structure hampers interaction with new tire materials. A team of researchers at Evonik has now made a key step forward with a process that could make it possible to use up to four times as much recycled rubber in new tires as in the past.