Many people claim that waste tires can be converted into gasoline and diesel with their technologies with small investment. So what is the truth?
Tires are polymer materials made of rubber, carbon black, sulfur, steel wire, fiber, additives and other materials through complex processes. Tires or rubber will crack at high temperatures (300-700°C), and the polymer network structure will be converted into products such as alkanes, olefins, benzene, naphthalene (these are called combustible gases and oils), carbon black, etc. Compounds such as sulfur, chlorine, and nitrogen are also mixed with combustible gases, oils, and carbon black. Due to the presence of sulfide, chloride, and benzene, the tires themselves and the products produced from waste tires have a strong odor.
At present, many Chinese pyrolysis plant manufacturers advertise that they can produce gasoline and diesel from waste tires with their pyrolysis plant (whether it is an stationary batch pyrolysis palnt, rotary batch pyrolysis plant or continuous pyrolysis plant). Tire oil is a mixed hydrocarbon mainly composed of aromatic hydrocarbons, with a density between 0.90-0.93kgs/Liter. It is a black fuel oil with strong odor smell. It is commonly known as tire oil at home and abroad.
Although someone later refined it through processes such as secondary evaporation, pickling, or so-called degumming agent degumming to change it into a light yellow oil, its molecular composition, distillation range, flash point, cetane number, sulfur content, major indicators such as nitrogen content, chlorine content, stability, and ash content are all very different from those of gasoline and diesel. Therefore, even if the tire oil is fractionated and simply refined, the distillate oil still cannot be used as gasoline or diesel.
