Tires play an essential role in modern society, but have enormous negative environmental impacts. Mongabay recently reported on how the world’s top tire manufacturers are unable to prove that the supply chain of their rubber products is deforestation-free.
A look back at an episode of Mongabay’s video series “Consumed,” published in January 2024, shows how one of humanity’s greatest inventions has left a trail of destruction, from the deforestation caused by rubber production to the pollution that spent tires leave at the end of their life cycle.
The six-minute explainer video traces how modern tires are made from both natural rubber and synthetic rubber, which is produced from fossil fuels. To meet the global demand for natural rubber, 70% of which is used to make tires, vast tracts of forests in Southeast Asia and West Africa have been cleared for rubber plantations. In Southeast Asia alone, 4 million hectares (about 10 million acres) of forest have been lost to rubber plantations since 1993.
Some 2.5 billion tires are produced every year, the Consumed episode explains. This has resulted in pollution of water, land and air.
To make a tire, rubber, even when sustainably sourced, is mixed with about 400 additives. As they wear over their lifetime, those tires shed various toxic chemicals and microplastics that end up in the air and in bodies of water.
“Studies show that car tire dust causes 2,000 times more particulate pollution than car exhausts. While tailpipe emissions are regulated, air pollution caused by tire wear and tear has gone unchecked for years,” the video says.
Every year, about a billion tires are discarded, with three in four ending up in landfills. The video shows what used to be the world’s largest dump site for tires, in Kuwait, where a huge fire in 2021 burned an estimated 1 million tires. In fact, open burning of tires is a common practice that emits high levels of dangerous gases such as carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide and sulfur dioxide. The tire chemicals also leach into the soil and aquifers.
There are other ways to deal with spent tires, such as recycling them into rubber mats, flooring and other products, the video shows. Alternatives to tropically sourced rubber, such as Russian dandelions (Taraxacum kok-saghyz) are also being explored.
The episode cautions that while the transition to electric vehicles will help address climate change, the heavier cars will contribute to faster wear and tear of tires. It suggests that the best solution is still improving mass transportation and reducing car use, although this change won’t happen overnight.
Watch the full video to learn more about rubber tires and their alternatives: “Rolling towards circularity? Tracking the trace of tires” by Abhishyant Kidangoor and Sandy Watt.
Banner image of a used tire by Marek Šašek via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0).
