ReThink Tires
Tire Recycling in Ontario
History of ReThink Tires since 2009
Ontario recently reached a pretty impressive milestone in its tire recycling history. Through the Ontario Tire Stewardship, the 100 millionth tire was recycled! As ReThink Tires was only formed in 2009, that is pretty impressive. And while the tire recycling mindset wasn’t born overnight, Ontario can boast a 100% diversion rate on collected old tires since that time.
So what does tire recycling look like in real terms? Well if you stacked 100 million tires one on top of each other, you would have the equivalent of 36,000 CN Towers. If you laid them side by side, they would cross Canada 11 times! For anyone who has ever travelled across Canada, you know that’s pretty far.
Milestones to 100 million announced by Andrew Horsman at the 2017 Green Living Show in Toronto
Economically, it has also meant the creation of hundreds of jobs, as all of Ontario’s old tires are recycled right here in Ontario. Those jobs include stewards, collectors of old tires, people who haul those tires to processors, the processors who convert old tires into recycled rubber, and manufacturers of new products from that recycled rubber. In fact, there is a factory just down the road in Chatham, Ontario which makes roof shingles. Products range from planters, landscaping tiles, rubber mulch, playground surfaces, carpet pads and acoustic underlays, roof shakes, rubber bricks, and athletic flooring. Research and development is constantly looking into new and innovative new products to develop from recycled rubber.
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- Old tires can be recycled into planters, landscape rocks, roofing materials, and the landscaping tiles seen here
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- Recycling tires creates jobs across Ontario, including those at 14 product manufacturers
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- Recycled rubber products, like Stomp Edge, can be found at your local big box stores
Where once those old tires were burned to get rid of them, or took up valuable space in landfills, now they are reused in a multi-million dollar industry. Government grants encourage the use of recycled rubber for community renewal projects like playgrounds, skating rinks, athletic floors in community centres, city sidewalks, and so much more. You can find recycled rubber in backyards, parks, parking lots, roads, anywhere where this environmentally friendly material might work. Recycled rubber products are long-lasting, shock-absorbing, noise reducing, durable, slip resistant and fire resistant.
So what are you waiting for? Old tires aren’t junk. They are a valuable resource that can be turned into an infinite number of things. Don’t let them collect dust in your yard or garage. Rethink tires and recycle them! Call Load of Rubbish to get rid of your old tires today.
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- Isn’t it amazing how an old tire…
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- can be turned into so many things!
[…] Waste concrete and asphalt turns into granulars once metal and foreign contaminants are removed. Old tires are free to drop off and get turned back into any number of new products. There is even a recycling […]