Mark Duncan / AP
Today's tires consist largely of natural rubber and petroleum derivatives, but manufacturers are looking for alternatives.
By Paul A. Eisenstein, NBC News logged-in user
If demand for tyres will keep and raw material shortages exist, can drive you soon on flowers and beans.
With more and more cars on the road everywhere from Beijing to Boston, tyre manufacturers were hard-pressed nagging shortages of factory capacity problems, to overcome rising material costs and limited availability of natural rubber.
Manufacturers, such as Bridgestone and Goodyear leads in search of alternative materials such as soybean and Russian dandelion.
"Natural rubber is a sustainable, renewable resource, but the problem is that the industry so Apache - building 82 million cars in the year jetzt-- that keep a problem grows," said Michael Martini, President, original equipment tire sale for Bridgestone of Americas. "So we are looking for alternatives."
India also known as rubber or rubber, natural rubber is mainly formed by manipulating LaTeX by tapped rubber trees collected. Bridgestone relies on plantations in Liberia and Malaysia, but their competitors in turn to resources in other parts of the world: Africa and Asia, South America and the Indian subcontinent.
Frenchman Charles Marie de La Condamine first some basic features of the material described in 1736 and 34 years later British scientist that the Joseph Priestley pencil was discovered that the material well rub, marked paper, hence the name, rubber. But the large breakthrough came in 1839 as the American Charles Goodyear discovered the process of vulcanization, which the natural material in long-lasting tires may be used.
These days, the black Donuts contain a mixture of compounds including Bisphenol, soot, sulphur and peroxide and various petroleum derivatives and reinforcement of the materials as steel, polyester and nylon on your car. Natural rubber is still around 25% of the weight of a typical car tires, and even more for those used on commercial vehicles.
The problem is that that vehicle sales are booming as Martini. While sales in existing markets of United States as, Japan and Europe may be relatively stagnant or declining, emerging markets are almost exponentially. The Chinese market alone is no longer just a few million vehicles a year to almost 20 million in a decade and is expected to reach 30 million by the end of the Decade.
It takes about seven years for a rubber plant from seedling to a productive, tires go. And another problem is to find more land for the expansion of plantations.
So, some members of the tyre industry PENRA-have-the program for the excellent natural rubber alternatives-based at the Ohio State University Ohio agricultural research and development center connected. Much promising alternative is one of the Russian dandelion, whose tribal structure seems extremely well to produce what from an almost identical with, common rubber tree or hevea comes from natural latex.
Botanist know the plant as Taraxacum Kok-saghyz-not the common dandelion, this is the curse of the struggling American homeowners keep to their lawns green.
"We know that it more than 1,200 species of plants from which natural rubber in theory could be harvested, but search, which may practically produce the quality and rubber required, the requirements of today's tire market is a challenge, said Dr. Hiroshi Mouri, President of Bridgestone Americas Center for research and technology."
Among the many possible alternatives researchers on guayule, a shrub, have zeroed the southwestern United States and Northern Mexico native of.
Tiremakers have also worked with synthetic alternatives to rubber. Such alternative was crucial for the American effort in the second world war, when supplies of natural rubber by Axis powers were largely cut off. The disadvantage is that plastics are largely dependent on the oil.
The tyre industry is supposed to find not only sustainable alternatives to natural rubber, but they now use mainly oil come with alternatives for some of the non-renewable materials.
The Goodyear Innovation Center has a new method could come up with, the researchers believe, replace soy oil for more than 7 million gallons of oil per year. Another advantage is that the alternative ingredient appears to be able to improve tread life of less than 10 percent.
"Consumers benefit through improved tread life, Goodyear receives with increased efficiency and energy savings and we all win when there are positive effects on the environment," said Jean-Claude Kihn, Goodyear of the technical head of the Office.
The project, financed by a grant of $500,000 from the United Soybean Board soy-based tyre testing see prototype this year start. If it lives up to expectations they consumers until 2015 reach, Goodyear said previously.
General Motors is trading at an all-time low and Ford is at its lowest level in more than a year. Michaeli, Citi auto analyst and Jeremy Anwyl, CEO of Edmunds Italy provide perspective.
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