Sustainability playing greater role in ADAC tyre tests

German motoring association ADAC will soon publish its 2023 summer tyre test together with partner clubs in Europe, and this year’s edition marks the 50th anniversary of ADAC tyre testing. To honour the occasion the association has tested 50 tyres in two sizes instead of the usual 30 or so. The half-century milestone is also accompanied by a shift in focus, with the ADAC adopting a ‘two-pillar’ model: In addition to safety-relevant driving qualities, in future it will place a greater emphasis upon each tyre’s environmental and sustainability characteristics.

Pillar number one is Driving Safety, which will contribute 70 per cent towards a tyre’s overall score. The second is Environmental Balance, and this will account for the remaining 30 per cent.

Driving Safety

Driving Safety includes all the usual disciplines such as braking and handling in a range of weather conditions, and ADAC’s changes here are minor: We’re accustomed to scores weighted differently for summer and cold weather tyres, but from this year onwards all-season tyres will also be weighted differently to their winter counterparts.

Performance on snow and ice will remain an important factor for all-season tyres but will play an even greater role when determining the score given to a winter tyre. ADAC explains that it is making this distinction to highlight the capabilities of all-season tyres in milder winter conditions while preventing motorists being lulled into a false sense of security by the 3PMSF sidewall marking.

ADAC test engineer Andreas Müller elaborates that winter testing is important for all-season tyres as they will “always be compared with winter tyres.” Winter conditions – snow and ice – thus contribute 20 per cent towards the Driving Safety score for all-season tyres. The weighting for winter tyres is 30 per cent. Explaining why a higher weighting is necessary, Müller comments that “many consumers just look at the results tables” of tyre tests and then expect an all-season tyre that’s rated very good or good to be able to master steep, snow-covered inclines just as safely as a winter tyre with the same rating. “We always have the consumer in mind,” he adds.

Environmental Balance

Sustainability is playing an increasingly important role in political decision-making and has also become a selling point, and in response to the growing significance of sustainability ADAC has introduced its second pillar. Now contributing 30 per cent towards a final tyre test score, Environmental Balance covers existing factors such as noise, mileage and efficiency as well as new criteria. Efficiency testing now includes tyre weight alongside fuel consumption in acknowledgement of the additional energy expended when heavier tyres rotate. ADAC also measures rate of abrasion.

In addition to these objective measures, ADAC will also evaluate sustainability in areas that don’t directly influence the driving experience. For example, a tyre can gain points for being produced in a country with recognised standards (covering, for instance, environmental protection and working conditions), for certifications such as ISO 14001 and 14040/44/25, or for participation in the UN Global Compact. As far as these factors are concerned, the weighting for all three product categories – summer, all-season and winter tyres – is one and the same.

Sustaining sustainability

Andreas Müller doesn’t expect to see any further changes to individual disciplines or their weighting within the Driving Safety category in the foreseeable future. It’s a different story when it comes to environmental performance and sustainability. He explains that one of the reasons ADAC has adopted the two-pillar model is that “environmental issues will continue to gain in significance, but this way we don’t always have to change everything entirely.” It will be possible to respond to future changes without influencing the driving disciplines. ADAC intends to maintain the 70:30 weighting between the two pillars.