Scrap tyre recycling process with molten zinc as direct heat transfer and solids separation fluid: A new reactor concept

Every year about 1.5 billion tyres are discarded worldwide representing a large amount of solid waste, but also a largely untapped source of raw materials. The objective of the method was to prove the concept of a novel scrap tyre recycling process which uses molten zinc as the direct heat transfer fluid and, simultaneously, uses this media to separate the solids products (i.e. steel and rCB) in a sink-float separation at an operating temperature of 450-470 °C. This methodology involved: •construction of the laboratory scale batch reactor,•separation of floating rCB from the zinc,•recovery of the steel from the bottom of the reactor following pyrolysis.