Our View: Tire makers showing needed leadership on sustainability

Air travel. Social media. Smart cars connected to intelligent infrastructure. Industry 4.0 and automation.

Sustainability.

In business, pleasure or for the planet itself, the world is more connected than ever before.

The proximity of things has become as important as the Internet of Things, and that is no more evident than the many points along the tire manufacturing supply chain.

To reach net zero goals by 2050, tire makers need everyone on board, particularly the upstream suppliers of carbon black.

And the CB industry—which depends almost exclusively on the tire and non-tire rubber space for demand—is responding in kind with new, greener production processes.

As defined by the testing and consulting firm Smithers in a recent report, methane pyrolysis, recovered carbon black, renewable carbon black and circular carbon black are the ways of the future. Combined, Smithers estimates that, by 2041, these methods will contribute 1.98 million tons to the global supply of carbon blacks, the equivalent of around 20 conventional carbon black furnace lines.

But getting there will take time and technology, cooperation and compromise, efforts that can be inimical to profitability.

While the CB industry analyzes the innovations necessary to produce specific grades of sustainable carbon black, something that is "non-negotiable" for tire makers to ensure performance and consumer safety, tire manufacturers are partnering with carbon capture companies to recover feedstock materials.

Tire pyrolysis appears to be the go-to method for tire manufacturers, as it "solves the end-of-life tire problem," one Bridgestone executive said.

But like the other three defined, sustainable CB production methods, it comes with some "demerits" in that specific grades of CB—and there can be many, in different parts of the tire—cannot be reproduced or are too costly compared to furnace black production.

And it is one reason why so little rCB—less than 1 percent on the global market—finds its way into new tires.

The realization that no business is an island in pursuit of a greener supply chain is a major step for tire producers.

As a representative from Bridgestone told Rubber News, "We want to be customers and not necessarily investors in this space."

But getting to 2050 with a clean slate, literally, will take continued cooperation to balance protection of the planet, consumer safety and continued profitability.

Any one of the three could be considered "non-negotiable."

Like the dreaded "performance triangle" that tire makers have tweaked to meet safety needs, the "sustainability triangle" is proving to be just as difficult to mold, as each corner can be inversely related.

The tire industry and its partners have succeeded in critical situations in the past.

The stated sustainability goals of the tire industry present perhaps the greatest challenges with the highest stakes, hurdles that upstream and downstream players have no choice but to clear once again.