PanAridus ships guayule-derived rubber to Cooper

US-based bioscience company PanAridus recently announced granting of its ninth US Department of Agriculture (USDA) plant variety patent and the first tyre quality, bale-sized shipment of its guayule-derived biorubber. The announcement was made by company CEO Mike Fraley at the recent International Tyre Exhibition and Conference in Akron.

Fraley said: “By continuing to diversify our plant varieties, we’ve overcome yet another obstacle in the 100-year quest to find a sustainable and domestically produced source of natural rubber. We’ve made guayule more adaptable to different soils and conditions, which should give the tyre industry more confidence than ever that we’ve reached the age in which a domestically produced source of natural rubber can be sustainably grown over predictable periods of time.”

Fraley added that the company has sent truck shipments of guayule rubber to Cooper Tire and Rubber as part of a $7 million USDA biomass R&D initiative grant.

“We’re filling orders as fast as we can now because we’ve satisfied the main concerns the tyre industry previously had about incorporating guayule into the manufacturing process. They’ve had their own scientists prove independently of our findings that our rubber exceeds their high standards, and we can produce it in a measurable and timely fashion,” Fraley said.