Dear “Earth Talk”: Can old tires be
recycled? If so, where, and what is the recycled material used for? —
George, Rockville, Md.
Old tires can indeed be recycled, and thanks to
concerted efforts by state and provincial governments from coast to coast,
as many as 80 percent of them are these days across North America. Some of
these old tires are remanufactured into new tires, but others are used in a
wide variety of applications, including railroad ties, rubber-modified
asphalt, athletic surfaces, insulation, plastic/rubber blends used in a
variety of products, and even fuel. The world’s first tires were made entirely of
natural rubber, but the Southeast Asian forests where the plants grew could
only produce so much. By World War II, most tires were composed primarily
of synthetic rubber made from petroleum products. Up until the 1960s, tires
were routinely recycled and broken down for use in making new tires. But
when imported oil got cheaper, demand for recycled synthetic rubber fell,
and caches of old tires with nowhere to go — most landfills
won’t accept them — began to sully landscapes all over North
America. These old tire stockpiles became havens for pests and mosquitoes,
and would even occasionally burst into flames and belch noxious chemicals
into the air. Beginning in the mid-1990s, state and provincial
governments in the United States and Canada led the charge in mandating and
funding tire-recycling efforts. In doing so they helped spur the markets
for reprocessed synthetic rubber that exist today. Now thousands of
companies across North America specialize in turning recycled synthetic
rubbers into useful new products. American consumers looking to offload old tires
should take a gander at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s
“Management of Scrap Tires” Web site to find tire-recycling
centers near them. The EPA also offers free business planning guides for
those who might be looking to start a tire-recycling or remanufacturing
business. The Web site Scrap Tire News also provides a wealth of knowledge
on different ways to get started. Despite this encouraging progress, North America
still faces a backlog of hundreds of millions of old tires, quickly piling
up outside filling stations and in back yards near you. The EPA estimates
that 290 million scrap tires are generated annually, representing 2 percent
of all solid waste, and that some 265 million are sitting in stockpiles
right now. At the very least, we could all take the advice of Participating in Nature: Thomas J. Elpel’s Field
Guide to Primitive Living Skills and turn
our old tires into “sandals with a 50,000 mile warranty!”
This article appears in Jun 22-28, 2006.
