With Summer intensifying across the world, a lot of you might be planning to replace your old tyres to avoid any mishaps on the road, but a very few think about properly disposing or recycling old car tyres ignoring the impact it would have on our environment. From becoming a breeding ground for mosquitos and vermin with deadly diseases to polluting the water which would ultimately affect the marine life, your old tyres could do more harm than just occupy unnecessary space. Furthermore, rubber is a combustible material and rubber fire is really hard to put out so, you would find yourself battling with dark smokes and a hard to put out fire if a pile catches a spark. 

It could take hundreds if not thousands of years for a rubber tyre to decompose. So, leaving them in your garage or throwing them into a junkyard is not a smart solution. The reason a car tyre takes such a long time to decompose is because of its strength and resilience which means that breaking it down or shredding it isn’t that simple either. Good thing, there are more than one ways to recycle your old tyres and you can use the same resilience to your advantage. Here are some practical ways and options to recycle your old tyres for those of you who would like to reduce their carbon footprint. 

Sell Your Tyres to the Collectors

If you think your tyres have given you everything they could and there is nothing more you could possibly get out of them then you are in for a surprise. They may not have any more miles left in them but you can still make money off of them. The most common and a simple way to get rid of your old tyres is to sell them to the collectors who supply them to different recycling facilities where they are used for several purposes. Some factories simply shred the old tyres, which have multiple applications while the others turn them into asphalt, construction material and even fuel.

The Wondrous Things You Can Do With Shredded Tyres 

One of the most common ways to recycle old tires is to shred and reduce them down to small pieces. These small shredded pieces can serve multiple purposes as they make for a great ecofriendly gravel substitute. The rubber mulch can be used pretty much anywhere instead of gravel. From highway embankment backfill to children’s playground and your garden, rubber mulch is used for both industrial as well as domestic purposes. Not only does it retain its appearance but also offers a soft cushioned surface as opposed to the hard gravel surface making it perfect for children’s play area. Furthermore, the fact that shredded tyre chips contain insulating properties, has encouraged farmers to use them as a cover for their plants and keep their soil insulated. They serve the same purpose as the regular mulch and are way more durable.

Rubberized Asphalt

Your old tyres might not have experienced best of the road conditions in their lifetime, but they can offer a smooth road surface to the countless other tyres. Rubber crumbs from the recycled tyres have long been mixed with asphalt concrete to produce a safer and ecofriendly asphalt for road constructions. It has the added benefit of providing better night time visibility to the drivers and reduces road noise by over 5 decibels. Furthermore, rubberized asphalt offers more durability with low maintenance cost.

Biofuel

With the growing energy needs around the world, finding the alternate fuel sources has always been a struggle. Luckily, scientists were able to find this source in our old tyres. There are several companies now that are processing old tyres to produce biofuel for diesel engines. Biofuel has proven to have the same efficiency as the conventional petrol and diesel yet it cuts down the emissions by 30% making it a more eco-friendly fuel source. The process of producing biofuel from old tyres is incredibly ecofriendly as it is emission free and uses the same recycled biofuel as the energy source.

Get creative

For anyone looking to put their creative skills to test, the old tyres are absolute treasure. There are plenty of things you can do with them. From coffee tables to garden furniture, planters and chandeliers, all you need is a bit of an imagination with some basic tools to give your old tyres a second life. Instead of spending huge sums on outdoor furniture that is known to fade and rust under the harsh weather conditions, why not turn your old tyres into colorful funky furniture that can withstand all sorts of weather conditions. Furthermore, they are not as heavy as the traditional metallic or concrete materials making them easy to carry and move around.

While Continental has always been at the forefront of introducing cutting edge technologies in tyres to increase their lifespan, we also deeply care about our environment and encourage our users to recycle their old tyres and play their part in making this planet a better place to live.