Edge Rubber becomes one of the most efficient scrap rubber recycling plants in the U.S.

SEATTLE (Waste Advantage): According to the Environmental Protection Agency, approximately 290 million scrap tires are generated in the U.S. each year. As recently as 1990, most of these scrap tires took up space in landfills or were dumped illegally. Today, many of them are recycled by companies such as Edge Rubber into various grades of ground rubber, also known as fine mesh crumb rubber.

Markets now exist for 233 million (80 percent) of all scrap tires. Some 130 million (56 percent) of these scrap tires are burned as fuel. Another 56 million (24 percent) are used in civil engineering projects such as artificial reefs, while 30 million (13 percent) are recycled into ground rubber. Another 16.5 million (7 percent) scrap tires are retreaded.

Of the 30 million scrap tires recycled into ground rubber, some 6 million (20 percent) find their way to the Edge Rubber plant in Chambersburg, PA, the oldest and most successful facility producing fine mesh crumb rubber in the U.S. One of the most efficient scrap rubber plants in the country, much of the plant’s efficiency is attributable to its bulk raw material handling system using six Flexicon bulk bag dischargers.

“On receiving the scrap tires, we first shred them into approximately ½ in. (1.3 cm) particles, which are gravity fed into 2,000 lb (907 kg) bulk bags,” says Sam Kauffman, Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of Edge Rubber. “These rough ground particles make up 80 percent of the raw material that we process into fine mesh crumb rubber.”

The other 20 percent arrives in small bags from tire retreaders that grind a portion of the tread from used tires prior to applying new tread to the carcasses, generating “buffings” that measure approximately 3/16 in. (0.5 cm).

Courtesy: This article originally ran in the January 2017 issue of Waste Advantage Magazine. View