45 professionals assembled in the headquarters of the Committee of the Regions in Brussels on January 19, 2012 to discuss perspectives of tyre recycling industry in converting from being burden to tyre producers to highly profitable business.

After decades of unsuccessful attempts to replicate different kinds of pyrolysis as a primary method of recycling, many tyre producers lost their confidence in finding market viable method of tyre recycling. However, the search shouldn’t be stopped - car consumption is growing almost all around the world, especially in developing economies, increasing therefore amount of tyres and rubber circulating in the market. Electric and alternative energy-driven vehicles as rolling on the same tyres as gasoline cars, which means that market will never go away.

The problem of existing tyre recycling lays in the very core of its essence: most of the methods and technologies are not only bringing any profit, but also pollute the environment. More to that, those methods doesn’t resolve the core issue of tyre recycling: they are just prolonging life on rubber, but not really “reusing it”. For instance, on the the popular methods of prolonging life cycle of rubber is shredding it in small pieces and afterwards using as a components in asphalts. Although some scientists argue it increases road flexibility, others say in the current circumstances of climate change and becoming more extreme from year to year, rubber crumb in the road dangerous as rubber badly stands very low temperatures. But the other problem is much more worrying. What to do with those components from asphalt after? Task of “collecting” them is very challenging and expensive, leaving them on the field creates danger for the environment. All of that clearly tells us that method is not anyhow sustainable.

The future is in almost 100% recycling cycle of tyre, with maximal recovery of energy and materials in the original form and value. Prolonging of tyre life cycle is an option, but it cannot provide long term sustainable response for the challenge introduced by the field.

Bamatek Europe, primary organizer of the conference, introduced innovative approach to tyre recycling addressing exactly the issue full recovery of materials and energy. Thermolysis process, going under milder than regular pyrolysis conditions (350 C), is performed in innovative patented machine treating rubber crumb and recovering up to 95-100% of original tyre weight and getting out technical carbon black, synthetic oil and heating gas as a by-products, either highly market-replicable (technical carbon black and synthetic oil of high quality) or possible to be re-used in further recycling process (heating gas). Rubber in this process is not going for “second round” - it’s appearing in a newborn components, which also (apart of numerous other possibilities) can be used in producing new tyres of the same or even higher quality.

Can this be a sustainable solution for future development of tyre production and treatment? It definitely can. For now, Bamatek Europe is searching for investors and partners who will be eager to join this journey towards making tyre recycling process truly Zero-Waste, moreover - profitable as enterprise.

Snapshots from speakers:

Michel Lebrun, Member of the Parliament of the French-speaking Community (Belgium), rapporteur for a "Resource efficient Europe - flagship initiative" and CoR Member

"Achieving a zero-waste society requires urgent action"

"Researching new methods of recycling tyres could turn waste into profit. In this way, we'd not only be making Europe greener, but also creating healthy jobs and enterprises on the market."

"Researching new methods of recycling tyres could turn waste into profit. In this way, we'd not only be making Europe greener, but also creating healthy jobs and enterprises on the market."

Beatriz Yordi, Head of Unit, Executive Agency for Competitiveness and Innovation (EACI) at the European Commission

“Recycling of wastes is one of the core priorities of the European Commission policies in long term future”

“The European Commission is ready to support projects, aimed at bringing innovation and turning process of recycling from economic burden into profitable business”

Dott Ettore Musacchi, President of the European Tyre Recycling Association (ETRA)

“Existing methods of tyre recycling mostly show unsatisfactory results, when it’s coming to economic viability of the process”

“Although statistics tells us overall majority of tyres is treated in the EU already, the remaining question is how they are treated and whether it creates harm for environment in long term perspective”

Roman Schamgulov, Chief Engineer of Bamatek

“The recycling machine is using rubber crumb of small size, treating it with relatively moderate temperature, which helps to save energy”

“In the end of the process, we receive high market-viable products - carbon black and synthetic oil, as well as hydrocarbon gas, which is then again used in the machine to  fuel the process further”

“About 95-100% of the tyre is recycled into materials: it is not prolongation of rubber life, but full recycling with perspective of making brand new tyres from high-quality by-products”

! DON'T MISS !

We would like to inform you that Bamatek will organize the presentation of the experimental plant in Estonia in May 2012. In case you are interested in joining the special delegation, please let us know and we will include you in the preliminary list of participants.