NASHVILLE, Tenn.— Bridgestone Americas Inc.has produced a run of demonstration passenger tires that it claims are built using 75% sustainable materials, including, for the first time, rubber harvested from the guayule shrub grown in Arizona.
Bridgestone said it considers this development a "significant milestone" on its journey towards achieving 100% sustainability by 2050. The company said it is using this demonstration run of 200 tires to pursue joint evaluation testing with selected automakers for use on the next generation of electrified SUVs and CUVs.
Produced at Bridgestone's Aiken County plant in Graniteville, S.C., the demonstration tires' materials makeup is said to be 37% recycled and 38% renewable.
"As we progress in our transformation to a sustainable solutions company, we are making incredible progress in the use of recycled and renewable materials to bring sustainable tire technology from the drawing board to the driveway," Paolo Ferrari, Bridgestone Americas president and CEO, said.
"The production and deployment of a 75% recycled and renewable materials tire technology marks a significant milestone as we accelerate our progress toward using fully sustainable materials in our products by 2050."
The tire maker has been aggressive in its research and development of guayule as an alternative natural rubber, making the material a central part of its vision for more than a decade. The company also has invested more than $100 million in those efforts. Prior to this, Bridgestone's efforts with guayule had been limited to its use in Firestone Firehawk racing tires for the IndyCar championship.
Last year, the tire maker expanded its guayule R&D with a $35 million USDA grant. It later disclosed a $42 million investment of its own that would help to commercially scale operations around the alternative NR.
Bridgestone also is employing sustainably sourced, biobased materials, including hevea, rice husk ash silica and plant-based oils and resin, in its efforts to enhance the sustainability of its products.
On the recycled materials side, Bridgestone is employing technologies that help to transform recycled plastics bottles into synthetic rubber and end-of-life tires into recycled carbon black made from tire pyrolysis oils.
The demonstration tire also is made with recycled steel, additional rCB and recycled rubber chemicals.
Moreover, Bridgestone said multiple materials used in the tires are ISCC Plus-certified, "ensuring transparency and traceability of sustainable raw materials including bio, bio-circular and circular-based material."
Bridgestone designed and engineered the demonstration tire at its Americas Technology Center in Akron.
Bridgestone's achievement parallels sustainability efforts by other tire makers, including:
- Apollo Tyres Ltd.'s 75% sustainable materials farm tire;
- Continental A.G.,'s focus on dandelion-derived alternative rubber and recycled PET;
- Goodyear's development of a demonstration truck tire that it said contained 90% sustainable materials content; and
- Michelin Group's debut of a pair of road-ready car and truck tires containing 45% and 58% sustainable materials, respectively.