Every year consumers in the United States toss 220,000,000 automobile tires in the trash. But while these defunct tires are being seen as useless by the majority, designer AnneMarie van Splunter has a much more inspired idea for their re-use: playgrounds! Her amazing ’Rubber Tree‘ design concept is a playground that utilizes discarded tires as its primary building material, turning piles of rubber into a sculptural playground for refugee children in Thailand.
Tires are best used if recycled to make……….new tires. Rubber is very resilient and can be reused in other products. Approximately, one tire is discarded per person per year. Their also often recycled for use on basketball courts and new shoe products. Tires are not desired at landfills, due to their large volumes and 75 percent void space, which quickly consumes valuable space which is why they are shredded. They can be used to make new next generation asphalt for roads which reduce road noise better than traditional paving. Pyrolysis can be used to reprocess the tires into fuel gas and even make activated carbon which is very useful for filtration processes. Ground rubber turned into molded rubber products using 18 million tires, ground rubber turned into rubber-modified asphalt using 12 million tires, Exported items using 9 million tires, cut, stamped and punched products using 6.5 million tires, and agricultural and miscellaneous uses 3 million tires
Is there a place to donate used tires and will they pick up? If so please email @nannyhooper@yahoo.com Thank you.
Charlotte Peters