Innovation Toronto
Now Reading
A new way to break down old tires into material for new ones
Innovation Toronto
Dark Light
  • Follow
Subscribe
Innovation Toronto
This unassuming material is capable of capturing or releasing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere in response to moisture swings.
Pulling carbon dioxide out of the air using moisture
A more efficient way to capture fresh water from the air
Bringing transformative potential to agriculture with a natural technology for ‘dimming’ genes
Staving off coral reef collapse via a new technique
Producing energy from evaporating tap or seawater with new nanoscale devices
Setting the stage for regenerative therapy by turning skin cells into limb cells

A new way to break down old tires into material for new ones

January 15, 2020

Graduate student Sijia Zheng pictured with Michael Brook. Photo by: Georgia Kirkos.

Article Highlights

  • A team of chemists at McMaster has discovered an innovative way to break down and dissolve the rubber used in automobile tires, a process which could lead to new recycling methods that have so far proven to be expensive, difficult and largely inefficient
  • The method, outlined in the journal Green Chemistry, addresses the enormous environmental burden posed by tires, approximately 3 billion of which were manufactured and purchased worldwide in 2019
  • Tires are a typical example of a product prepared for a single use from a non-renewable resource. While some are used as fuel in the cement industry or broken down into crumbs to use as fillers in asphalt, cement or artificial turf, there is no convenient method for recovering the petroleum-based polymers from which they are made so they cannot be easily reused, effectively repurposed, or recycled
  • In the paper, researchers describe a process to efficiently break down the polymeric oils by breaking the sulfur-to-sulfur bond. Brook likens the structure to a piece of fishnet
  • “We have found a way to cut all the horizontal lines so instead of having a net, you now have a large number of ropes, which can be isolated and reprocessed much more easily,” he says
  • The new method could help to eliminate and prevent the major environmental concerns and dangers posed by stockpiled tires
  • While promising, researchers caution that the new method has some limitations because it is expensive for industrial applications
  • “We’re working on it, but this is the first major step. This process closes the loop on automotive rubber, allowing old tires to be converted into new products,” says Brook
The Complete Story: McMaster chemists find new way to break down old tires into material for new ones

McMaster University

The Latest Updates from Bing News & Google News

Go deeper with Bing News on:
Tire recycling
Go deeper with Google Headlines on:
Tire recycling

[google_news title=”” keyword=”tire recycling” num_posts=”5″ blurb_length=”0″ show_thumb=”left”]

Go deeper with Bing News on:
Tyre recycling
Go deeper with Google Headlines on:
Tyre recycling

[google_news title=”” keyword=”tyre recycling” num_posts=”5″ blurb_length=”0″ show_thumb=”left”]

Tags
What's Your Reaction?
Don't Like it!
0
I Like it!
0
View Comments (0)

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Scroll To Top