Together with two other South Korean firms, Hankook Tire & Technology has developed the country’s first tyre using cord fibre sourced from chemically recycled PET. The tyre maker partnered with SK chemicals and Hyosung Advanced Materials to develop Hankook iON tyres containing “circular recycled PET fibre tyre cords.” The resulting product is the first tyre to wear the ISCC Plus certification logo.
Selected sizes within the Continental PremiumContact 6, EcoContact 6 and AllSeasonContact tyre ranges will now contain recycled polyester yarn obtained from plastic PET bottles. The recycled yarn completely replaces conventional polyester within the tyre casing, with around 40 PET bottles needed for a typical set of passenger car tyres.
We’re used to encountering yarn spun from recycled polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles in clothing and soft furnishings, but from next year motorists will be able to buy Continental tyres containing this material. Continental will use PET-sourced polyester yarns in the construction of tyre casings and says these can “completely replace” conventional polyester. It will present a concept tyre built upon a PET polyester casing at the IAA Mobility show in Munich this September.
Operations have started at the recently-completed 3,500 square metre polyester line built at the Kordsa plant in Izmit, Turkey. Kordsa’s Tire Reinforcement business unit commenced work on the additional line in December 2017, and 100 million Turkish lira (£13.3 million) has been invested to provide an additional 7,000 tonnes of polyester yarn capacity. The project was carried out as part of plans announced in 2016 to invest $30 million in further capacity for Korda’s plants in Turkey and Indonesia.
Kordsa is expanding its polyester capacity at its plant in Izmit, Turkey. With the addition of new facilities and equipment, Kordsa aims to have an additional polyester yarn capacity of 7000 tons with an additional 3,500 m2 area in its current facility this year.
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