On March 8, Allianz Zukunft Reifen (AZuR) was announced as the winner of the 2023 Recircle Award in the Circular Economy category at TyreXpo Asia 2023 in Singapore. With the internationally renowned prize, AZuR’s commitment to tyre retreading was recognised in particular.
Christina Guth Lauded for Work in Circular Economy
The Recircle Award was personally presented to AZuR Network coordinator Christina Guth and Stephan Rau (Technical Director of the WdK and AZuR patron) by David Wilson, Publisher of Retreading Business.
Christina Guth acknowledged the Recircle Award as an “award for all AZuR partners from industry, trade and science and the culmination of our joint commitment to a sustainable circular tyre economy.”
In the laudatory speech, AZuR’s commitment to sustainable tyre recycling in Germany and more and more European countries over the past three years was acknowledged. In particular, Wilson emphasised “the rapid growth of the network, which is unique in the world, and the preparation of an ecological assessment of retreading that was long overdue.”
The award follows AZuR’s presentation in September 2022 of a comprehensive life cycle assessment for car and commercial vehicle tyres achieved with the support of the German Federal Environmental Foundation (DBU).
The life cycle assessment drawn up by the Fraunhofer Institute UMSICHT makes it clear that qualitatively retreaded branded tyres require around 50 percent less energy in production and cause over 60 percent less CO2 than comparable new tyres with comparable performance, while saving natural resources and avoiding waste.
According to the life cycle assessment, retreaded car tyres are also ahead of comparable new tyres in the overall CO2 balance (mileage 20,000 km/40,000 km). This makes retreads the perfect circular economy product.
Stephan Rau also sees the Recircle Award in the Circular Economy category as “a personal award for the commitment of network coordinator Christina Guth. I am confident that this international award will give us momentum to achieve our mission of reusing or recycling 100 percent of tyres,” he said.
Christina Guth expressed her thanks for the award and appealed to all market players to “invest even more in the development of qualitative retreading”. She also appealed to new tyre manufacturers to “produce tyres in such a way that they can be retreaded. If both succeed, then there is an opportunity to significantly increase the proportion of retreaded tyres and thus make an important contribution to CO2 reduction and resource conservation worldwide,” she said.
