Australian tire recycler in $100m deal to set up plants in US

Warren, New South Wales — Australian recycler Green Distillation Technologies (GDT) is stepping up its international activities with a recent deal to build its first tire recovery site in the US.

The agreement provides funding of up to $100 million (€90 million) for the roll out of additional plants in the US, if the first project is successful, the company said in a 7 Jan statement.

The company declined to comment on the parties involved in the deal and the location of first plant when contacted by ERJ, stating that more information would be disclosed “in the fullness of time”.

Commenting on the deal, GDT’s chief operating officer Trevor Bayley, said the agreement was achieved through a considerable amount of negotiation. 

According to Bayley, the US currently generates in excess of 250 million end-of-life tires a year. 

“In the light of this burgeoning environmental disposal problem our approach provides a recycling solution as we turn a problem into valuable and saleable materials,” he added.

Green Distillation has developed an emissions-free “proprietary technology” which is capable of recycling end?of?life car and truck tires into saleable commodities of carbon, oil and steel.

The company claims that the oil produced through its technology is comparable with “light crude, which is low in sulphur and easy to refine into petrol, diesel, jet fuel and other petroleum based products.”

GDC also maintains that the carbon produced in the process is a high-grade product with high potential for sale as carbon black. 

The deal marks GDT’s second overseas project, following an agreement in October last year with waste-to-power specialist Volco Power to establish up to five tire recycling plants in South Africa.

That deal could potentially be worth up to AUD$50 million, according to the company.

GDT plants each comprise of six tire processing modules and will process approximately 700,000 old tires per year into eight million litres of oil, 7,700 tonnes of carbon black and 2,000 tonnes of steel.

The company currently operates one plant in Warren in Western, New South Wales and is working on a second plant to be built in Toowoomba, Queensland.