A new research project undertaken by Tyre Stewardship Australia (TSA) and RMIT University (RMIT) in Melbourne, will evaluate the performance of crumb rubber made from passenger car tyres in bitumen and asphalt. The project aims to ascertain whether there are any performance differences between passenger and truck tyres in asphalt road applications.
At present, most crumb rubber asphalt and sealing almost exclusively uses recycled tyres from trucks, because truck tyres have a higher content of natural rubber, thus better chemical compatibility with bitumen, explained RMIT’s Dr. Filippo Giustozzi.
Beginning in November 2020, TSA and RMIT, the leading academic institution in Australia for asphalt and bitumen research and development, will run bitumen lab testing until July 2021, with asphalt testing completed a year later.
“Most recycling infrastructure in Australia is currently set up to process only truck tyres into crumb and granule because the market for passenger tyres is so small. However, we intend to use passenger car tyres – or a combination of truck and passenger tyres – to produce crumb rubber mixes with 5% to 20% rubber.”
The project is believed to be the first of its kind in Australia, and is expected to “allow the road industry to respond to the increasing push of the Australian Government for recycling more while ‘exporting’ less,” according to TSA CEO Lina Goodman.