News: Tire Recycling & Pyrolysis

Plymouth’s huge tire factory operated by Bandvulc Group has demonstrated impressive expansion since it was purchased by Continental Tyre Group in 2017. Currently, it handles a quarter of UK’s market, which is staggering 180,000 retreaded tires annually. Thus, Bandvulc Group has gradually gained a status of the UK’s key fleet management service provider that also functions as a truck tire retreader.

China’s Changzhou’s Bohai New Area was chosen by local company Lunte Petrochemical as a site for a new waste tire recycling plant with the annual capacity of over 238 kilotonnes. The announcement was made by Chinese authorities in October. The facility’s commissioning has become possible due to Lunte’s phase one plan that saw investment of USD 289.2 million (2 billion CNY).

Given durability and non-biodegradable nature of tires, these products pose an incredible challenge for waste managers all over the world, including Oman. However, a student from Caledonian College of Engineering (CCE) in Oman, Fatma Sulaiman Nasser al Kindi, has come up with an innovative solution in her country when she suggested how waste tires could be used in the construction industry. She, same as other researchers, pinpointed that scrap tires pose a threat to the environment on a global level. When Fatma noticed that tires were normally dumped in the streets and junkyards in Oman polluting the environment, she was puzzled with a question how tires containing a lot of precious material could be used in a productive way. Later, she decided that tire recycling enabling development of concrete aggregate out of scrap tires was the answer.

A new tire recycling line has been commissioned and installed in Poland by American tire recycling equipment manufacturer CM Shredders. The company says it is the second CM line in Europe intended for tire pyrolysis / gasification industry. CM Shredders (formerly Columbus McKinnon) revealed that its system is capable of manufacturing rubber free of wire, which may be used as a feedstock in tire pyrolysis. In addition, the equipment produces purified steel wire from tires.

Tyre Stewardship Australia (TSA) has found in its recent study that Australia annually deals with over 55 million waste tires, with 30 percent of the amount being heavy truck and mining tires. One of sustainable methods to extend life of the precious material is recycling after which rubber can be used in municipal paving projects. Some of the country’s roads are already composed of asphalt mixes and rubber powder spray-seals that contain recycled rubber; their usage is being promoted by the TSA and the industry. In addition, TSA helps create rubberized permeable pavements, which result in promotion of more advanced methods to manage complex water systems in urban areas.

Tire recycling businesses focused on rubber mulch, crumb rubber and rubber powder production now have a chance to make their operations even more green and sustainable. Indeed, production chain of every tire recycling business includes packaging – so called “big bags” made of polypropylene (PP). While recyclers help clean up hazardous tire stockpiles and reuse thousands tons of high-quality rubber in industrial applications, why shouldn’t they deliver their recycled goods using recycled packaging? This article describes recent breakthroughs in designing high-quality sustainable packaging – big bags – made by an Austrian company KSM Solutions.

Two huge piles with thousands of tires were abandoned in Dickens Street, Peterborough, by a rogue trader and now pose a fire risk threatening railway security and households’ safety in the neighborhood. The railway between Birmingham and Stansted Airport may face closure as a result of the illegal actions of a rogue trader from Huntingdon, Michael Newsome. According to prosecutor for the Environment Agency Gurjit Bdesha, the trader rented a site to carry out tire shredding activities which had never taken place. Instead, the land was used as a tire storage and it accommodated more tires than was officially permitted. Moreover, Newsome’s actions – unsanctioned accumulation of large amounts of scrap tires – created a fire risk. The official also noted that the closest household to the dangerous tire site is only 13 meters away.

The Manitoba authorities have expressed their commitment to ongoing scrap tire recycling initiatives stressing that existing producer responsibility organization Tire Stewardship Manitoba will not be dropped. The provincial tire recycling system relies on producer responsibility organization funded by the industry that assists in various sorts of waste disposal and recycling. In total, Manitoba has 12 similar initiatives.

According to Mexico’s Secretariat of Environment and Natural Resources, the country witnesses a huge number of neglected discarded tires. Because of the pressing issue, some businesses are willing to construct a tire recycling facility in the Lagunera province, says the Secretary of Environment of Coahuila Eglantina Canales Gutiérrez. Today, there is a scrap tire collection unit in Lagunera province called Paseo de las Piedras 350, but what is still lacking is proper recycling of scrap tires into crumb rubber, steel and other reusable materials.