The Yokohama Rubber Co. announced that it will supply ADVAN racing tires with a sustainable material content as the control tire for the Japanese Super Formula Championship from the 2023 season. The company has completed development of tires for use in dry conditions and will continue developing tires for wet conditions with the aim of supplying them from 2023.

The dry condition tires being supplied by Yokohama Rubber use natural rubber and various naturally derived compounding agents including oil produced from oil palm nuts and orange peels, as well as recycled iron, rubber recycled from end-of-life tires, and synthetic rubber produced using the mass balance method – a method that allows you to label a commercial product as a biomass-derived product based on the volume of biomass-derived raw materials used during the process of turning raw materials into final products and the distribution process. Commercial products labeled as biomass-derived raw products therefore are regarded as fully biomass-derived regardless of their actual volume of biomass-derived materials.

As a result, sustainable materials account for about 33% of all materials used in the tires, which have demonstrated performance equivalent to that of the standard tires used in Super Formula 2022 races.

Racing tires made from sustainable materials will be supplied in support of the Super Formula Next 50 (SF NEXT 50) project announced in October 2021 by Japan Race Promotion Inc., which runs the Super Formula series. The SF NEXT 50 project is being promoted with the cooperation of various companies that share the common goal of creating a sustainable motorsports industry by responding to changes in the environment surrounding the automobile and motorsports industries, including the promotion of SDGs and carbon neutrality.

Aiming to develop racing tires that include sustainable materials without compromising driving performance, Yokohama Rubber tested its tires as part of the trial runs for next-generation formula cars that were held before and after each Super Formula race during the 2022 season. The company will continue its efforts to develop tires with higher sustainable material content in 2023 and coming years.

Under Yokohama Rubber’s three-year (2021–2023) medium-term management plan YX2023, the consumer tire business aims to maximize the sales ratios of high-value-added Yokohama tires, namely the global flagship ADVAN brand, the GEOLANDAR brand of tires for SUVs and pickup trucks, and various winter tires. The plan also positions participation in motorsports activities as crucial to Yokohama Rubber’s development of advanced tire technologies and strengthening of its ADVAN and GEOLANDAR brands. The company’s development of high-performance and top-quality tires for new cars and the replacement market benefits from the technologies accumulated through its participation in a wide variety of motorsports events in Japan and around the globe, from top-category races to grassroots races. Yokohama Rubber also is promoting sustainability initiatives based on the concept of “Caring for the Future.” The company believes that conducting its business activities aligned with these sustainability initiatives will help resolve social issues and lead to the continued increase of its corporate value. One goal of Yokohama Rubber’s sustainability initiatives is to contribute to the realization of a circular economy. Toward that end, Yokohama Rubber aims to increase the ratio of renewable and recyclable materials used by the company to more than 30% of total materials used by 2030 and then raise that ratio to 100% in 2050.

Press release by Yokohama.