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ENVIROform Recycles Life into Old Tires by Doris Wolf, Staff Writer |
(Geneva, New York) - When thousands of tires went up in flames recently in Chautauqua County [New York], many people saw only billowing black smoke. but Robert L. Bates saw the loss of millions of new products - bumpers, splash blocks, speed bumps and wheel chocks to name a few.
"This country discards 250 million tires a year, 12.5 million in New York state alone," Bates said as he explained his company, Enviroform Products. "That's the equivalent of 3 million barrels of oil in energy being poured right back into the ground every year."
"We are now at the crossroads. Nationwide, we face a crisis - a pile of tires 100 yards long and more than 400 feet tall enters American landfills annually. Quite frankly, we are running out of room. It's time to act."
For Bates, that meant coming up with new ideas.
"I started researching what could be done with them. Everyone was talking about shredding them, grinding them. But there was no end user. I decided to be an end user."
Bates developed a process to form shredded or powdered rubber, called crumb, into "anything and everything you can mold."
That attracted the U. S. Navy, which ordered a shipment of 4,400 square feet of 2-foot-square patio blocks to pave the playground of a child-care center in Norfolk, Virginia. "Children can fall down on it without risking a broken arm or leg," Bates said.
Today ENVIROform Recycled Products, Inc. produces all sorts of useful products from microphone bases to sign bases, speed bumps to hose ramps, and much more.
Check out our product line to see if we have a product that meets your needs.
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