Tyre manufacturers association to undertake the responsibility of initiating steps in structuring the National Used Tyre Recycling policy in conjunction with the Ministry of Environment & Forestry. This policy could be in line with the ETRA framework or the CATRA framework. There is also the French recycling association – Aliapur and the American ISRI, which can be referred to. The right recycling policy will be a combination of learnings from the west amalgamated with our market conditions. The mission of the association can be on the lines what ETRA president mentioned in his interview. – “It will be formalize tyre recycling as an independent, multi- sectoral industry involved in a long chain of activities and to assist in the realisation of cost-effective as well as environmentally sound and commercially viable tyre recycling activities.The need of the hour is to implement policies and adopt behaviours that are more sustainable and respectful for future generations.” The association can form an internal commitee engaged in the innovation process of the sector in many ways: Developing new products and applications, improving the processes, trying to make them more sustainable and to add more value of the end products. The committee thus formed will be involved in many R&D projects, either as co-ordinator or partner, and could also work together with international partner to facilitate the exploitation of the results.

Secondly, to commit a sustainable disposal plan for a small percentage of end of life tyres by the association to start off with. This will necessitate the levy of a small insignificant disposal charge on new tyres sold. The amount recovered will enable the collection and storage of end of life tyres in an organised manner. The end of life tyres will then be sold only to licensed recyclers at viable prices. The licensed recyclers will be allowed only association approved processes and methods for recycling. The end products will again go into the rubber industry completing the loop. This system can be started with the metros as a pilot project and then taken to the tier B and tier C towns in phases. Thirdly, on the processors side, choosing the right kind of equipment for primary and secondary shredding and downsising of used tyres is very important.

This choice of equipment has to be the blend of technically experienced and robust on one side and reasonably priced on the other side. I would advise use of the European and American experienced equipments vis a vis the cheaper but unexperienced options. It has been seen in this sector that robust equipments deliver better value for money in the long runs with better running cost. The running cost and low downtime determine viability in the waste recycling industry. The cost could be reduced by getting the main equipments from the west and sourcing the supporting conveying equipments locally. To my estimate this could cut down the total plant package cost by about 30 per cent to 35 per cent.

Once the end of life tyres are cut/granulated/powdered to size, then the options of various products being manufactured from the same are many today. New and innovative products are being made from crumb rubber. We are not very far away from the day when complete new tyres will be made from this end of life tyres thus completing the loop in all senses and saving natural resources. The organised ELT recycling journey will start with all stake holders acknowledging the responsibility for disposal and recycling. I will sign off this note with my take on the famous lines that sums up the journey ahead: “The roads are lonely and steep, It’s miles to go before I sleep.”

– Rahul Shringarpure