BlackCycle project claims ‘pyrolysis optimisation’ milestone

Project produces 60,000 litres of “optimised pyrolysis oil” from end-of-life tires

Dillingen, Germany – Tire recycling and sustainability initiative, the BlackCycle Project has reached a new milestone with the successful optimisation of waste tire pyrolysis process.

In a statement 8 June, Pyrum Innovations AG which supplies the pyrolysis technology for end-of-life tyres (ELT), said a trial campaign to optimise its process was completed on 24 May and 60,000 litres of “optimised pyrolysis oil” was delivered to Spanish project partner Sisener Ingenieros SL.

The campaign involved ‘extensive laboratory-scale research’ on various process conditions regarding the composition of ELT, the temperature profile and the residence time, said Pyrum.

The next step, said German recycler, is the distillation of the oil, which is then processed by Orion Engineered Carbons into sustainable carbon black (sCB) and used by Michelin in new tires.

Unveiled by project partners in November last year, the sCB is claimed to have identical characteristics to conventional carbon black of the same quality, with the significant difference that it is produced from a sustainable secondary raw material.

Launched in May 2020, the BlackCycle project will run until the end of August 2023 and is funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme.

As part of the project, 13 companies from five EU countries are researching a sustainable process to recycle recovered materials from end-of-life tires back into new tire production.

This includes the collection and selection of raw materials from ELT, as well as the optimisation of pyrolysis, oil refining and recycling.