Tire, Tire burning Bright
Posted: Wednesday, October 05, 2011
by Dianne Lehmann
Artisan Jewelry from SyZyGy
We've all heard about piles of used automobile tires catching fire. We've seen the videos. Maybe some of us have witnessed it first hand and smelled the stench. Piling tire upon tire upon tire really isn't a fitting or environmentally sound end to their useful life of rolling cars down the roads.
Discarded tires placed whole in tire dumps serve as a breeding ground for mosquitoes, some of which are sure to be carrying diseases. Tire fires, which seem to be inevitable, contaminate the air, ground and water. And once they get started they are abysmally difficult to put out if not completely impossible and will burn for days and weeks. In April of 1999, a tire fire started in approximately seven million tires near the town of Tracy, CA. It burned for well over eight months. Clouds of acrid smoke containing hydrocarbons, benzene, and other pollutants drifted everywhere with the winds. Inhabitants of the surrounding area with breathing problems were told to remain indoors until it was extinguished. If you think you are safe from the fallout of a tire fire in your area, check online for the nearest tire dump. I did and I was shocked at what I found.
One company, Magnum Recycling USA, Inc. located northwest of Hudson, Co is at the site of the world's largest tire dump. At one time, at least, they had over 30 million tires awaiting treatment.
The problem of scrap tires is far worse in the USA than in Europe. In the USA, an estimated 300 million tires are disposed of annually. That's a lot of tires. You can make only so many doormats out of used tires and frankly, I haven't seen one of those in years. I remember there was a time someone was making sandals that used tire treads for soles but I don't think that really caught on.
One way in which used tires can be recycled is as a fuel source for generating power, but this is very inefficient. Incineration occurs at higher temperatures than coal and it produces 25% more energy, but since burning a ton of tires produces almost the same amount of carbon, it really isn't very eco-friendly.
There are currently several ways in which tires are recycled. One use is in creating rubberized asphalt for highways. According to the EPA, 7.4 million tires were ground and used as a component in new highways in 2005. This not only recycles scrap tires, but also lowers the cost of highway construction. There has been a lot of "pavement rehabilitation" (that's what the project signs call it … not me … I have more sense than that) going on in the area where I live recently. Judging by the odor, there is a very good chance they are using recycled tires. I can smell the difference between virgin asphalt and burned tire any day.
Luckily, growing markets exist for a majority of the scrap tires produced every year that are supported by state and local governments. Tires are also often recycled for use on basketball courts and in new shoe products (well that's what my research indicates, but they must be grinding them up first instead of using whole pieces of tread). Other programs turn tires into ground rubber or rubber shreds, used to create ground cover for playgrounds, backfill for civil engineering programs, garden mulch (I've seen bags of this at our local plant nursery), erosion control barriers or drainage foundations around buildings.
I would like to propose another use for ground up scrap tires. Everyone in the United States should take up riding dressage and put a dressage arena (space permitting) in their back yard. They should mix ground tire with sand for the footing (the sand helps to keep the heat down … or you could cover your arena). I've read that it makes for great drainage and it is easy on the horses. Regulation dressage arenas are 20 meters wide by 60 meters long and the footing should be about two to three inches deep. If you are into reigning or cutting instead, you might want the arena to be wider and the footing to be a little deeper. That could use up a lot of old tires.
Obviously, that is not really a viable solution. Not everyone is as smitten with horses as I am. But the fact remains that we have to find some better uses for discarded tires. They are a blight and a menace and need to be dealt with.
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Top-level comments on this article: (7 total)OOOH I have another use for old tires! Make everyone build tire swings in their back yards, tire playgrounds, and tire planters. That way we all get to grow things and play all day.
Well, it was a great article Dianne! Thanks!Hi Krista.
That's an excellent suggestion! We could all use a little more play time and a better connection to the earth!
Thanks for reading.
Hugs,
Dianne
I like Krista's Idea. We could also decorate them in the form of tire graffiti. We could paint them, then stack them, then insert a custom sized trash receptacle. They make a good obstacle course for exercise.
I agree, burning tires are disgusting.
Hi Suzi.
Wow! Everyone is coming up with some great ideas about what to do with them. My article was more of a complaint so it really makes me feel good that it's engendered creative thinking instead of more griping!
The only problem I see with some of the ideas is that you would have to find a way to keep water from stagnating inside of the tires and providing a breeding ground for mosquitoes. Insecticides could be used on the interiors periodically, but I prefer not to use dangerous chemicals as much as possible.
Thanks for stopping by!
Hugs,
Dianne
I had no idea tires would keep burning like that. I know that my horse stall mats are made out of recycled tires. I know about the arenas and aisle ways. They get a fair amount of money for these products on top of it. I also thought they used fine chipped up tires in some playgrounds but that I'm might not be accurate about. I wonder why they cannot just recycle and reuse the recycled tires for tires again. I also believe that if tires are incinerated in the recycle places, they use the resulting heat for cogeneration. I believe the problem though is that the burning of tires requires vast cleaning and environmental stats and it's not cost effective. Everything being relative, it's all about the money.Hi Heidi.
I had wondered about the mats ... now I know.
Some people do recycle tires into tires, but mostly I think they do that by applying new tread (retreads). It is also illegal to do that in some states because they have a nasty habit of falling apart.
Yes, it is all about the money ... unfortunately. It's hard to get away from that these days.
At least people are finding good ways to recycle the ubiquitous plastic bag. Guess we need to start a movement to get people thinking more about used tires. :)
Hugs,
DianneYou know, I've been wondering about some of the newer type tires - I see them on the sporty cars. I'm sure I'm showing my ignorance here but are they only for racing cars? They are not nearly as high or however you'd express what they look like. I've seen quite a few of them on cars lately. I don't know if they are thicker or whatever. Also wanted to say to you that the picture you included is dreadful. It really shows what we're up against with tires. It's a huge mountain of nothing but tires.I think they call those tires "low profile."
I was wondering if readers would notice the three little people in the photo! Really puts it in perspective doesn't it.Oh I noticed alright. It's an ugly perspective! More than my mind ever wants to comprehend.
I guess it really is about the money when you start to talk about these things. PANDORA smiles at us again with the cost and filth and extra work it takes to completely deal with the auto industry. She says: "Here's a wonderful gift, the modern tire. And so now, how do you rid yourself of them?"
What about Greg's shoe building? These shoes are probably indestructible, and there is probably no money in shoes sent round the world to poor people. Oh well. Great article!!!Hi Christofer.
Sometimes it seems to me that many of the things we do to make our lives "better" or at least easier frequently come back to bite us in the butt. The nuclear generation of electricity comes to mind.
Christofer, using tires to make shoes for third-world peoples is a great idea! But I've a feeling it would only scratch the surface of the number of used tires sitting uselessly out there in dumps.
Thanks for your thoughts.
Hugs,
Dianne
Wow, 300 MILLION tires - and that's just in the US! That photo blows me away, Dianne.
You know what surprises me? That nobody has yet come up with a viable way to recycle them. Think about all that raw material just waiting to be picked up and used. Somebody could make themselves a fortune.
Imagine if there was a way of grinding them down and bonding them with something, so they could be used in building somehow. What about swimming pools...Hi Jennifer.
And we just keep making more and more tires!
But there are people looking for more ways to reuse them ... thankfully.
The photo is an extreme case, but I used it anyway. Most of the other photos I found weren't quite so bad. But I did find one photo of a tire dump in Arizona out in the Sonora Desert that was pretty darn huge. With a little bit of forethought, though, they separated the piles of tires so that if one pile catches on fire, they don't all have to go up.
We definitely need more ways to recycle them.
Hugs,
Dianne
I dont have any great ideas for old tires but I learned much from reading your article--thanks.
SteveHi Steve.
That's me ... an educator at heart. :) But goodness, I was I pain in the derriere when I was younger.
Thanks for stopping by!
Hugs,
Dianne
Hi Dianne,
I always have to check the spelling when I write your name, very tricky of you!! Your tale is I am afraid the sorry tale of how we have evolved. Tyres are big business, as are the cars they are fitted too, probably the tecnology exists to make a longer lasting tyre and car, come to that, but.......
We currently live in flatland, we are encumbered in a one dimensional mindset where profit is king and not only is it sad, it is stupid. What can we do? Keep pecking away, eventually the tree of ignorance will fall over and maybe, just maybe the tree of wisdom will rise.
Keep on keeping on. Best wishes, TerrenceHi Terrence.
I always have to check the spelling of your name too. :) Mom wanted my name to be a little different. A friend once told me be careful what you name your pet after we named the cat that we had at the time, Weezil (weasle). We were warned we might get what we named it. Maybe that applies to people too ... you know ... different. :)
I look around me and I see a world based on always making more and more money. I wonder how it came to be that way. Very rarely do I think it is a good thing. We don't raise our own food anymore. We don't make our own clothing or build our own furniture. It's moved us away from the real and planted us firmly in the virtual. Because even though you can hold "money" in your hand, it is still a concept. There is no solid relationship between it and the things it provides as in a bartering system.
I'm not pining for the "good old days." I just think we need to take a harder look at how we do things.
And yes, all we can do is keep trying, never give up on spreading the word no matter how large the opposition or great the apathy. Go us!
Hugs,
Dianne
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