UK tyre retailer boosts recycling effort

ERJ staff report (DS)

St Albans, UK -- UK-based tyre retailer, Kwik-Fit Fleet has opened a £10 million National Distribution Centre designed to be the hub of a major recycling operation.

A fleet of 69 trucks delivers tyres to retail outlets centres daily, and in a process known as 'reverse logistics' return to the National Distribution Centre reloaded with worn out tyres, removed tyre casings and scrap catalytic converters. The industry first 'one-for-one exchange' results in trucks travelling fully loaded in both directions, thus saving up to three million miles a year and an estimated 3,000 tonnes of carbon in reduced emissions.

Once back at the National Distribution Centre a specially installed machine shreds more than six million tyres a year removed from company and privately-owned cars and vans. Head of Kwik-Fit Fleet Mike Wise said: “We view worn out tyres not as rubbish, but as the raw product for something else.