Sumitomo Rubber boards Japan recycling partnership

Hyogo, Japan – Sumitomo Rubber Industries (SRI) has joined an initiative aimed at advancing rubber recycling technologies and creating a rubber circular economy.

SRI and Sumitomo Electric Industries have partnered with Sumitomo Riko and US-based LanzaTech Global to transform waste materials, including rubber, into “valuable resources”.

Initially launched in November last year, the project aims to reuse rubber, resin and urethane waste for the production of isoprene.

In a statement 3 Aug, SRI said the decision to join the project aligned with its circular economy concept “Towanowa,” which promotes “recovery & recycling”.

The project, it added, will tap into SRI’s “reservoir of big data” to develop “groundbreaking and value-added solutions”.

The partners will leverage LanzaTech’s bio-recycling technology which ‘gasifies’ waste materials and purifies the resulting gas.

The gas is then put through a “fermentation process” that transforms it into isoprene.

SRI said its goal is to explore the feasibility of establishing a recycling technology that enables the reuse of isoprene as materials for rubber and resin.

Furthermore, the project is considering the possibility of recycling the metals recovered from the “gasifying process” of tires and reusing them as raw materials.

According to SRI, the group manufactures 110 million units of tires per year, a significant number of which are scrapped each year.

With “Towanowa”, said SRI, the aim is to “create a system that transforms discarded tires into useful resources.”

The collaboration will be a key part of the Japanese group’s R&D effort to advance its recycling technologies.

“We intend to continue intensifying our endeavours in each process of the circular business concept… and use data to boost efficiency in our internal development,” SRI concluded.