Used tires repurposed as fuel in Canada

Lafarge Canada and its partner Systech Environmental have been selected to collect and process over 900,000 scrap tires generated in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia each year.

Lafarge will use the scrap tires as an alternate fuel source at its cement kiln in Brookfield, NS. Sixty percent of the total tires collected from across the province will be used in the Brookfield facility; the remaining tires will be transported to a Lafarge cement kiln in Quebec to be used as fuel.

"Using scrap tires as an alternate fuel source provides an environmentally sustainable and responsible way to transform used tires from a waste into a resource," said Bill Ring, CEO of RRFB Nova Scotia. "Recovering the energy from scrap tires will reduce Lafarge's use of coal as a primary fuel, and cut down on greenhouse gas emissions. When you consider the big picture, using tires as a fuel supplement in cement kilns is an environmentally sound process that will result in net benefits to the people of Nova Scotia."

Lafarge Canada will be required to secure any necessary approvals from the Nova Scotia Department of Environment and Labour before it can proceed to use scrap tires as an alternate fuel at its Brookfield facility.

The use of tire-derived fuel in cement kilns has been proven elsewhere in North America, Europe and Japan. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, with the proper controls in place, the use of tire-derived fuel in cement kilns does not create added harmful air emissions or by-products.

An independent scientific report was commissioned to assess the potential air quality impacts of using scrap tires as a fuel supplement at the Brookfield cement facility. The report, conducted by environmental consulting firm Conestoga-Rovers and Associates, found that "the use of TDF (tire-derived fuel) in the Brookfield kiln will not have an adverse effect on ambient air quality and will provide many environmental and community benefits."

Benefits were identified as the reduction in the use of fossil fuels, energy cost savings for cement kiln operations, more efficient tire transport and safer storage and disposal of large quantities of scrap tires.

The Conestoga-Rovers and Associates (CRA) report was peer-reviewed by GlobalTox Consultants International, which specializes in human and environmental toxicology. The GlobalTox report states that based on its review of the CRA report, "the inclusion of waste tires in the Lafarge Brookfield, NS plant's fuel will have a negligible impact on air quality locally."

Cleantech developments making news in the past 24 hours

• Qteros claims 15-fold improvements in cellulosic ethanol yield
• Solairedirect raises €20M to move into commercial solar
• Intel, Numonyx open $20M water treatment plant in Israel
• Booming data-center business creates troubles for India

View the last week of cleantech developments here | Subscribe to full feed