Alcoa: rubber hits the road on tyre recycling

Old tyres are being given a new life thanks to an innovative recycling project involving Alcoa Australia and Tyrecycle’s newly established East Rockingham, WA, facility.

The “off-the-road” (OTR) haul truck tyres that have reached the end of their operational life are being sent from Alcoa’s bauxite mines in the Peel and South West regions to the local Tyrecycle facility where they are processed to create a crumbed rubber product.

The resulting product can be used for a variety of applications including as a crumbed rubber modified bitumen, and a range of soft-surface applications such as those used on athletics tracks and in playgrounds.

Alcoa water and waste global program manager Nicole King says the recycling project has been a long time in the making and is the culmination of significant collaboration between Alcoa and Tyrecycle.

“We wanted to be sure our end-of-life OTR tyres were being managed and generating products that support our waste management objectives,” she said.

“We have set ourselves the global goal of a 25% reduction in landfilled waste by 2030 from a 2015 baseline.

“OTR tyres are a significant material stream for our WA mining operations and recycling end-of-life tyres will make a contribution towards achieving our goal.

“In addition, Tyrecycle’s location and solution help us work towards Alcoa’s global ambition to achieve carbon net zero by 2050.

“Being located in the region where we operate, the new recycling facility also meets our focus on supporting local business and jobs.”

According to Tyrecycle, 130,000t of OTR tyres reach their end of life in Australia each year and less than 10% of these are being recycled, posing a considerable environmental challenge. The company adds that every tonne of crumb rubber used in asphalt mixes represents a significant greenhouse gas saving.

Tyrecycle chief executive Jim Fairweather says the East Rockingham facility was Australia’s largest and most flexible tyre recycling facility, catering for OTR tyres as well as commercial and passenger tyres.

“Our partnership with Alcoa marks our first contracted agreement with a South West mining operator to recycle OTR tyres,” he said.

“Tyrecycle’s goal is to deliver sustainable outcomes for our clients, where waste is a resource, not a problem and we are proud to have established this state-of-the-art facility in the Rockingham region with strong support from government and industry.”

Ms King says that Alcoa is investigating recycling solutions for other rubber products including end of life conveyer belts, as well as looking at opportunities to use the crumbed rubber product at Alcoa facilities.

“We are considering opportunities to use some of the rubber crumb from Tyrecycle in roadworks around our operations,” she said.

“Doing so would represent a great outcome with our own tyres being recycled into rubber crumb and repurposed within our own operations.”