Waste Tire solutions essays

Waste Tire solutions essays In the United States there is a serious safety problem, and economic opportunity. Automotive tires are often forgotten about when it comes to maintenance, and disposing of them. The Federal Government has billions in grants available for companies to find alternative uses for tires other than land filling. Few companies have volunteered their services because there is a lack of technology, and economic incentive to recycle tires. Land filling has some short-term benefits, but in the long-term, the health effects will affect you from disease-ridden mosquitoes, and pollution, to uncontrollable tire fires. In 2000 there were almost 300 million used tires discarded in the United States, over half of the tires were recycled or elese untilized for other applications. Approximately 110 million were either legally land filled or illegally added to the over 800 plus million tires that are already land filled in the United States. (ARC Inc) Waste tires represent a number of environmental, health and safety hazards to the public, as well as a public nuisance. In the state of Pennsylvania, about 12 million scrap tires are generated a year. While approximately 16 million scrap tires remain in large stockpiles scattered throughout the sate. (DEP- 4/26/01) Tire piles have the potential to create an environmental and health hazards for residents in neighboring communities. Rainwater collects in the tire piles creating an ideal environment for mosquitoes, which are known to transmit disease to humans. Because the tires partially fill with water regardless of their position and absorb sunlight, they provide an ideal environment for hatched larva. Although tire dumps are sometimes associated with rodents, the primary problem has been various species of mosquitoes. (DEP-4/26/01) These mosquitos, Ades triseratus and Culex pipiens, transmit three strains of encephalitis: Lacrosse encephalitis, St Louis encephalitis, and the West Nile virus. Recentl...