300,000,000 scrap tires every year.
That’s right – approximately 300 million scrap tires are generated in the USA every single year.
With markets existing for approximately 85% of these 300 million scrap tires, that leaves about 45 million tires left in stockpiles across the country - each year. That’s a lot of tires, a lot of rubber, and none of it is good for the environment.
The good news is that approximately 80% of scrap tires today are re-purposed and 90% of stockpiles have been abated through landfill abatement laws. The bad news is there are still approximately 100 million scrap tires in US stockpiles. Here in Colorado, we are home to the largest stockpiles of waste tires in the nation. Statistics from 2014 revealed that Colorado’s landfills held two monstrous stockpiles with over 60 million scrap tires – this is more than half of stockpiled waste tires in the entire country. One of the country's smallest states, Vermont, recently stated that it has 62 known tire piles of more than 100 tires in each pile. Their cleanup cost is estimated at $1 million or more and funding is needed.
In case anyone needs a refresher on why tires in landfills pose a problem, here is just an overview of some of the problems….tires are approximately 75% void space, which takes up a lot of landfill space. They can trap methane gases making them buoyant and "bubbling" to the surface. This bubbling effect can damage landfill liners that are designed to contain landfill contaminates and prevent air and water pollution. When these tires come to the surface and become exposed to the elements, they can hold water and be a breeding space for mosquitoes, rats, snakes and other vermin. Although stockpile fires may be rare in recent times, they are a huge hazard when they occur. These types of fires are difficult to put out, and are toxic to the environment in that they product of heavy smoke and toxic run off to waterways.
With at least 15% of scrap tires being added to landfills each year, there is a constant need to find innovative ways to reuse these scrap tires.
The most common re-purposing of scrap tires is conversion into products that can be used in rubberized asphalt, road beds, running tracks, bed liners for trucks, shoe/boot soles, rubber floor mats, and sports and recreational playing surfaces, such as synthetic turf. The two most successful reuse techniques for scrap tires are rubberized asphalt and synthetic turf. Wait a minute, my kid plays on that turf……
Non Governmental Organizations (NGO’s) have long had concerns about ground-up rubber tires used as garden mulch and playground mulch. In some states, tire scrap is considered "Special Waste", meaning that special permits and associated costs are required to dispose of scrap tires. How is it possible that this same tire scrap can be cut up and sold to people and businesses as "Playground Mulch" and "Garden Mulch"?
Scrap tires contain a lot of toxic substances, including phthalates, some of which are hormone disrupting chemicals and are suspected to be a developmental toxicant, endocrine toxicant and reproductive toxicant. Endocrine disruptors like phthalates are recognized as a global public health threat by the World Health Organization (WHO) as one of the biggest public health threats of this and possibly the next centuries. WHO has stated that they are a global threat to health and the environment that needs to be resolved as soon as possible. Some phthalates are so toxic that they are being restricted in the European Union to a .1% homogeneous material weight in electronic components and .1% article weight in finished goods. What’s more is that phthalates can be released from plastics and migrate to other plastics and materials. So, in the EU these chemical are being restricted, and here in the US our kids are playing on it. We know there has to be a better way to re-use these tires.
Finally, now not only NGOs and concerned parents are worried about this, but three US government agencies are funding a $2.86 million study of crumb rubber turf and its possible cancer causing effects.
On February 12th 2016 three federal agencies said they will undertake a coordinated research project to study the human health and environmental effects of recycled crumb rubber used as artificial turf on athletic fields and playgrounds. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention/Agency for Toxic Substances, and the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission are joining up for this research project and estimate that a draft status report will be released by the end of 2016. In November 2015, four members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee wrote the EPA with 10 questions about what the agency knows about possible connections between rubber turf and cancer. Concerns about health risks from exposure to tire crumb may have been an impetus for the project.
There is no question that scrap tires are a problem and that tire recycling methods have been evolving for decades. But there has been no current commercialized application for recycling scrap tires using Green Chemistry methods… until now.
Patent No. 9,303,134