Ecology, Good for Business, Industry, Latvia

"We recently also launched cooperation with [the Estonian state-owned energy group] Eesti Energia, which produces oil from shredded tires. In addition, we're naturally also interested in cooperating with other Estonian businesses to ensure that used tires be recycled, not dumped in nature," Eco Baltia told LETA/BNS.

"The volume of tires recycled at the plant will help reduce 26,600 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions each year, which is equal to the annual electricity consumption of 4,200 households. By gradually increasing production capacity, it is expected that the plant will be able to process up to 10,000 tonnes of worn tires annually in the next two years," Janis Aizbalts, chairman of the board of SIA Eco Baltia vide, said.

The new plant is equipped with the most modern tire recycling units available on the market. These units minimize and eliminate various potential risks of pollution and ensure energy-efficient and environmentally friendly production processes.

During the process of recycling, the tires will be shredded into small strips and transferred for further recovery to be used as fuel for energy production in special furnaces, thus reducing the use of newly acquired fossil fuels. In addition, the processing procedure will involve separating metal and textile from tire rubber, to produce crumb rubber of varying roughness. 

The produced crumb rubber will serve as raw material for manufacturing new products e.g. rubber surfacing for playgrounds and football fields, components for asphalt-bituminous mixtures, etc. The projected product sales include both domestic sales and export.

"The tire recycling plant created by SIA Eco Baltia vide will also serve as an important contribution in the context of Latvia's environmental well-being and economic development. The plant will help ensure that we can efficiently and sustainably process the tire waste generated in Latvia into new raw materials, thus giving them new value, rather than leaving them in the environment or landfills. Furthermore, the technologies we use will also allow recycling electrical cables in the future, which is a new waste recycling direction in Latvia," Aizbalts said.

The plant will mainly recycle tires collected from Latvian businesses and private individuals, and in smaller quantities also tires from Estonia.