Old rubber hits the road

Logan City Council has teamed with tyre industry group, Tyre Stewardship Australia (TSA), to trial a new eco-friendly road surface.

The surface is a combination of old tyres and reclaimed asphalt and will be installed on Lagoon Road, Carbrook over the next month.

TSA has committed $150,000 to the trial and additional laboratory testing, which aims to prove that the new surface will be as good as, or better than, standard road sealing.

Logan City Council Director of Road Water Infrastructure Daryl Ross said Council is always looking at innovative ways to deliver better roads.

“Council wants to build a road network that is suitable for our growing region,” he said.

“This partnership with Tyre Stewardship Australia aims to enhance road quality for users in a cost-effective way.”

Tyre Stewardship Australia CEO Lina Goodman said the trial is about creating a recycled road product that saves money while delivering a safe and reliable product.

“It also has a huge environmental benefit to the community because it is using recycled tyres,” Ms. Goodman said.

The trial will begin in May and initial results are expected by August. Queensland firm Fulton Hogan will construct the road.

‘Crumb rubber’ is produced by reducing scrap tyres down to its basic materials and removing steel and fibre along with any other contaminants such as dust, glass or rock.

Reclaimed asphalt consists of old, damaged pavement materials milled and crushed into a new mixture.

According to TSA’s latest data, Australia generated the equivalent of 56 million used car tyres last financial year.

Eighty-nine percent of them were recovered for reuse or processed into tyre derived products. The rest ended up in landfill or were stockpiled.

In Queensland, the equivalent of 12.7 million car tyres were generated with a similar recovery rate of 69 per cent. Around 14 per cent of the recovered tyres were locally recycled into crumb rubber and granules.