The US Department of Energy (DOE) is providing funding to support a US$1.25 million collaborative project of Pittsburgh-headquartered coatings company PPG and the Tennessee-based rubber and tyre company Bridgestone Americas. This project focuses on improving the fuel efficiency of truck and bus radial tyres using PPG’s Agilon performance silica platform.
The goal of the project is to deliver prototype tyres to DOE that help trucks and buses achieve fuel-efficiency improvements of 4 to 6% while maintaining or improving tear strength and tread wear. Research and development work for the project will be completed at PPG’s Monroeville, Pennsylvania, facility.
Anup Jain, PPG Vice President, specialty coatings and materials, said PPG’s collaboration with Bridgestone has the potential to significantly change the truck tyre industry, further commenting that the DOE funding validates PPG’s preliminary research findings that Agilon performance silica has significant potential as a next-generation filler to help increase truck tyre fuel efficiency.
Improving the fuel efficiency of trucks and buses would provide significant economic and environmental benefits. According to DOE reports, heavy-duty vehicles comprise only 4% of all vehicles on US roads but consume approximately 20% of all fuel.
PPG estimates that if even 25% of all tractor-trailers on the road improved fuel efficiency by 4%, they would consume 750 million fewer gallons of diesel fuel annually, saving nearly US$2 billion and reducing carbon-dioxide (CO2) emissions by nearly 8 million metric tonnes.
According to Kurt Danielson, President, Bridgestone Commercial Group, Bridgestone has a long-standing commitment to environmental sustainability. The company’s environmental mission is “to help ensure a healthy environment for current and future generations”. Citing a 2005 data, the company’s mid-term target is to achieve a 35% reduction in CO2 emissions by 2020.
Agilon performance silica is a high-value technology platform of chemically modified precipitated silica that can improve the performance of rubber products in which it is used. Testing indicates that the chemical modifications used to produce Agilon performance silica make the silica more compatible with the natural rubber typically used in truck and bus radial tyre applications. This will allow the silica to better mix with the rubber, enabling better tyre performance than is possible with conventional silicas.