Jack Williams

Tires, Both On the Car and in the Asphalt

Did you just replace your tires? First, congratulations on addressing an often neglected aspect of auto maintenance. You might meet your old tires again, though, and if you do, they might be underneath your new ones … mixed into the road surface you're driving on.

Traditional asphalt needs polymers to ensure its flexibility so that it can expand and contract without cracking during seasonal temperature changes. Those polymers are generally made from petroleum. The nearly tenfold increase in the price of oil since 1998 has caused asphalt producers to seek an alternative material.

Enter recycled tires.

The United States generates about 280 million scrap tires each year, creating a waste problem that has eluded a perfect solution. Tire dumps can pollute water supplies with arsenic and other chemicals while providing breeding grounds for mosquitoes and sometimes leading to spectacular (and spectacularly dirty) fires that are very difficult to extinguish.

It turns out that in addition to costing less, recycled tire rubber actually performs better than petroleum based additives when added to roadway asphalt mix.

Bridgestone America has partnered with Liberty Tire Recycling, North America's largest tire recycler, to promote recycled tires for use in roadways across the country. Georgia, Florida, Arizona, and other southern states have begun using the material, but adoption has been slow. The companies say that if all 50 states used recycled tires in their roadways, it would completely use up our yearly pile of scrap tires.

How often do we get to save tax money, reduce our dependence on oil products, and get rid of an environmental mess all at once?