Working as the lead agency in the Biomass Research and Development Initiative (BRDI) grant, “Securing the Future of Natural Rubber—an American Tire and Bioenergy Platform from Guayule”, Cooper Tire & Rubber Company recently announced that its scientists have reached a significant milestone towards the company’s goal of developing a concept tyre made of guayule-based polymers instead of natural and synthetic rubber.
Guayule (pronounced wah- / gwah-YOO-lee) is a shrub that is grown primarily in the south western United States and contains rubber that can be processed for use in tyres. Following its production, the 100% guayule-based concept tyre will still need to undergo extensive technical evaluation. Cooper is also planning to further study the potential commercialisation of the guayule-based tyres.
Cooper has already completed a number of tyre builds that have replaced both Hevea and synthetic rubber with guayule in various components, and are testing each build for overall performance. At the BRDI annual meeting, Cooper announced that it has completed this process on nearly all tire components, and has tested these tires with promising results.
“We have nearly finished our work on developing guayule-based tire components and have tested these tyres to assure a full performance evaluation,” said Chuck Yurkovich, Cooper’s Senior Vice President of Global Research & Development. “The results are highly promising. We have proven that we can replace traditional polymers with guayule in certain components, and that tyres made from these components perform equal to conventional tyres. We are optimising the use of guayule formulations to develop not only a full guayule tyre, but we will also evaluate guayule blends in certain components where an advantage has been shown to exist,” Yurkovich added.
The company is also working with the Agricultural Research Service of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA-ARS). The ARS has completed the most extensive irrigation study ever done on guayule for the potential raising of a massive crop in the south western US for the rubber production process.
In their study of two guayule fields in Maricopa, Arizona, the ARS found that drip irrigation offered the most benefits over other irrigation techniques when it comes to maximising yield and minimising water usage.
The ARS is also working with Cornell University to sequence the guayule genome that will lead to advance improvements in terms of yield, resistance to disease and pests, cold tolerance and other factors.
Clemson University, another grant consortium partner, is in charge of studying the environmental impacts of the entire tyre life cycle using guayule versus traditional Hevea rubber in tyre production. Clemson will also help quantify the sustainability of the effort from genome to tyre production and through the service life and disposal of tyres.
Pan Aridus, a bioscience company in Casa Grande, Arizona, produces the rubber used in the tyre builds and testing. They have also developed varieties of guayule with increased rubber content, in quantities never before achieved for use in modern tyres.