Approximately 290 million tires are discarded in the U.S. each year. Tires break down very slowly in the environment and cause havoc in a landfill. It takes approximately 50-80 years for a tire to decompose in a landfill.

Automobile tires are a high volume product derived from non-renewable petroleum resources and designed for single use. Many tires end up in landfills where they risk contaminating the local environment through leachate, a liquid that diffuses through waste sites and into the ground.

Industry leaders continually work to establish a range of products that can be made from the recovered polymers. The rubber can be efficiently degraded and then reused to make other useful materials. Experts continually look for methods to re-purpose the valuable materials used tires provide while simultaneously addressing the environmental problem.