Fletcher Building, an integrated manufacturer and distributor of world-leading building and construction products and services, has been given a NZ$13.6 million grant by the government of New Zealand towards new technology that will allow the company to use scrap tyres as fuel at its Golden Bay Cement plant in Portland, Northland.
The NZ$18.1 million project used shredded tyres in the fuel mix to reduce the plant’s reliance on coal by 14%.
Golden Bay Cement is the country’s fifth biggest carbon emitter and the substitution of rubber biofuel for coal will reduce those emissions by 13,000 tonnes per year, or the equivalent of 6,000 cars.
Fletcher’s building products division chief executive Matt Crockett said the investment from Fletchers and the Ministry for the Environment’s Waste Minimisation Fund would create wins for both the company and the environment.
“Golden Bay will be part of a sustainable solution to reduce tyres that are illegally dumped or sent to landfills,” he said.”With the ministry’s support, the Portland plant will have a sustainable future with a low-carbon fuel mix of end-of-life tyres and wood waste.”
Tyre-derived fuel or TDF is used widely in Europe and the US in cement kilns.
Once fully operational, the kiln will take around 3.1 million shredded tyres a year, replacing the need for 15,000 tonnes of coal and 5,000 tonnes of iron sand and cutting the plant’s iron sand use in half.
Heated up to over 1,000 degrees Celsius, the tyres burned with no increased emissions or waste to dispose of.
Environment Minister Nick Smith said New Zealand threw away five million tyres every year so the Fletcher plant would be a substantial help in dealing with their disposal..
Another NZ$1.2million will be given to another seven smaller tyre waste projects, including NZ$600,000 to Eco Rubber Industries for NZ$2.4millio worth of machinery to produce rubber granules for rubber underlay. That would use up 600,000 tyres a year.
Nufuels was granted NZ$90,000 for a NZ$135,000 pilot pyrolysis plant which would use 150,000 tyres per year, and other grants were made to Scion and Fulton Hogan cover feasibility studies into using recycled rubber for sound proof building products, roading and cycleway construction.
All up, the government and industry were investing NZ$28million into tyre waste solutions, he said.
“Combined with the new regulations restricting stockpiling, these measures will go a huge way towards a sustainable solution to New Zealand’s end of life tyre problem.”