Cyprus-Forum.com

[The Microphone]

Every vehicle, truck, coach, car, pushbike, moped etc (and others) have rubber tyres.

Now. All these tyres wear out. ie.. the rubber is graually removed from the tyre by friction and the tyres are eventaully replaced and the process repeats itself. Agreed? (only occasionall here in Cyprus I know, but thats not the issue).

What happens to all these tons and tons of rubber? It MUST go somewhere.

I reckon there's a secret army of ecowarriors who come out at night and collect it.

My question is:- 'Where do you put it and is this rubber waste disposed of in an 'environmentally-friendly way'. Or do you all have piles of it in your gardens???

[free_cyprus]

Every vehicle, truck, coach, car, pushbike, moped etc (and others) have rubber tyres.

Now. All these tyres wear out. ie.. the rubber is graually removed from the tyre by friction and the tyres are eventaully replaced and the process repeats itself. Agreed? (only occasionall here in Cyprus I know, but thats not the issue).

What happens to all these tons and tons of rubber? It MUST go somewhere.

I reckon there's a secret army of ecowarriors who come out at night and collect it.

My question is:- 'Where do you put it and is this rubber waste disposed of in an 'environmentally-friendly way'. Or do you all have piles of it in your gardens???

tyres are recycled and there are many products that are made from them like pencil cases ect

[cyprusgrump]

Every vehicle, truck, coach, car, pushbike, moped etc (and others) have rubber tyres.

Now. All these tyres wear out. ie.. the rubber is graually removed from the tyre by friction and the tyres are eventaully replaced and the process repeats itself. Agreed? (only occasionall here in Cyprus I know, but thats not the issue).

What happens to all these tons and tons of rubber? It MUST go somewhere.

I reckon there's a secret army of ecowarriors who come out at night and collect it.

My question is:- 'Where do you put it and is this rubber waste disposed of in an 'environmentally-friendly way'. Or do you all have piles of it in your gardens???

tyres are recycled and there are many products that are made from them like pencil cases ect

But not the bit that gets worn off the tyre during use – I think that’s the point.

[free_cyprus]

Every vehicle, truck, coach, car, pushbike, moped etc (and others) have rubber tyres.

Now. All these tyres wear out. ie.. the rubber is graually removed from the tyre by friction and the tyres are eventaully replaced and the process repeats itself. Agreed? (only occasionall here in Cyprus I know, but thats not the issue).

What happens to all these tons and tons of rubber? It MUST go somewhere.

I reckon there's a secret army of ecowarriors who come out at night and collect it.

My question is:- 'Where do you put it and is this rubber waste disposed of in an 'environmentally-friendly way'. Or do you all have piles of it in your gardens???

tyres are recycled and there are many products that are made from them like pencil cases ect

But not the bit that gets worn off the tyre during use – I think that’s the point.

the bits that are work are like billions of dead skin flakes your body looses and they go to the same place as the worn rubber on the tyre goes you work it out

[devil]

And its not just the tyre but the road surface it rubs against. It's called dust and probably represents less than 1% of the dust in the atmosphere. I wrote about [url=http://www.cypenv.org/Files/cars.htm#Particulate%20matter%20from%20friction%20between%20tyres%20and%20road%20surfaces]this
subject[/url] in the Cyprus: the Environment website.

That having been said, may I ask why you think that those who care about the world we live in should be "tree huggers, bearded sandal wearers and..."? I can assure you that most of the people in this sector are not as you describe. I worked with the United Nations Environment Programme since 1989 and I know of no one who fits that description: they are mostly serious scientists, engineers and economists and they dress and look like any other professional person. It is clear that you have an extreme prejudice, possibly engendered by extremist ecopolitical NGO members. The real environmentalists are not extremists.

Personally, I am not a tree-hugger but a professional environmentalist. Yes, I wear sandals in the summer: don't you? Yes, I have worn a beard for the last two years or so and I'll tell you why: I had a stroke which left the mobility of my right arm restricted, making it difficult to shave, as I had done nearly every day for the previous 55 or so years. Does that justify your derogatory implication? Or are you just plain pig-ignorant about what is going on around you?

[The Microphone]

My my devil...we are a cantancerous whatsit aren't we? It was people exactly like you who said that 'travelling at more than 20mph would lead to asphyxiation' when trains were invented. That of course turned out to be a load of codswallop. Those responsible? Respected scientists! They also said the earth was flat. If you had your way thats what we'd still believe. Go back and talk to your daffodils!

And get that great big chip off your shoulder mate!!!!!!!!! Potato or wood. You decide.

[devil]

I have no chip on my shoulder, as you obviously do. You haven't got a clue what you are talking about me and you cannot substantiate a single thing that you wrote in your last message because it is all lies. And, if I were so backward and stick-in-the-mud, as you imply, perhaps you can explain why, just last week, the United Nations honoured me with their Innovators Award, recognising "the extraordinary contribution of persons whose daring and hard work facilitated the widespread implementation of alternatives or alternative technologies that enabled the phase-out of ozone depleting substances to take place" or why the US EPA also awarded me their “Best-of-Best” Award whose official citation on the plaque states "For Leadership in the Phase-out of Ozone-depleting Solvents". Doesn't exactly sound like I'm the Luddite you imply. I'm working for a better world for you to live in.

[Nikitas]

Some of the rubber stays in the road surface some goes into the air as dust. Once I managed the office of a major multinational in Athens and we had problems- dizzy spells, headaches etc,- and an environmenta engineer ws called in from the USA.

He took air samples and had them analysed in laboratories in the USA. We were told that the samples contained rubber, mineral particles inlcuding asbestos, to "normal air levels". Asked about this they said that normal healthy air has levels of particles and chemical which are apparently acceptable under certain levels.

[devil]

Yup, Nikitas, what you say is true, but there is a lot of argument as what is "acceptable", especially bitumen dust from road "asphalt", which is possibly carcinogenic. There are two schools of thought regarding carcinogens. One states there is a threshold level below which cancer will not develop and the other states that exposure to minute levels has a cumulative effect. Unfortunately, it is extremely difficult, if not impossible, to prove either school is right because of confounding factors. In reality, it would seem that both or neither are right and that constant minute exposure does not cause cancer to develop, but it may reduce the body's immune system so that if exposure to a higher level occurs subsequently, it may have a more serious effect than if the earlier exposure had not occurred. Epidemiology is not a really exact science and relies on statistical surveys with cohorts of thousands of persons in varying situations for a picture to develop.

I remember, I was operating a sensitive analytical instrument in my lab about 20 m from a main road one cold day. I started to get some unexpected results and found that the problem was caused by a mixture of salt and calcium chloride. I scratched my head as to where it could come from. Looking out the window, I saw a road gritter passing on the main road. Going out, I found it was salting the road as they expected black ice to form. Car tyres crushed the salt and threw it up as a very fine dust, actually an aerosol suspension, and it drifted into my lab within a matter of minutes, through closed doors and windows. This shows how pervasive road dust is. The quantity was tiny, but enough to upset my instrument, which was sensitive to the order of nanograms, and would otherwise be undetectable (and, of course, harmless to humans). I had a client in Rennes, in the root of Britanny, about 50 km from the coast, and he had a similar experience but when there was a strong onshore storm wind blowing sea salt all that distance.

[Nikitas]

Yep, Devil,

Statistics is the mainstay of medical science it seems. And the other thing that surprises is how many so called natural substances in the right concentration can be harmful- manure dust used to harm people back in the days of horse drawn transport when the streets were full of the stuff- yet most people would regard horse drawn transport more ecological than modern cars because it produces natural by products.

Rubber being a natural product, (though it is a sure bet that it is mixed with other things in tyres), would seem to be one of those "natural" materials. At least it must be biodegradable once it settles on the soil as dust or so one would think.

Devil, as you are an environmental engineer maybe you could give us a simple answer to a what I think is a simple question regarding solar PV panels. I got very confused during a recent exhibition regarding output. I was looking for a simple formula like "so many watts per square meter at peak". The figures we got were a little too complex for a layman to understand. So how many watts do modern PV panels produce at peak per square meter?