India is the world's third-largest car market, but tire waste is a growing problem. As of 2025, manufacturers and importers will have to recycle all of their end-of-life tires, and there are calls for the government to support green technologies.
"It's important that we don't dump them in landfills as that could lead to an infestation of pests," Krishna Propoorna from the India Institute of Technology Tirupati told DW. "Even if you incinerate [them], the incineration of tires can be very detrimental to the environment. Burying tires can pollute the environment, and putting them in landfills will also damage the ecosystem."
However, the town of Vada, located 75 kilometers outside Mumbai, is home to one of India's leading tire recyclers. The company grinds up tire waste to produce a material used to reinforce asphalt for road construction. It says it has recycled 6 million used tires for this purpose over the past decade.
Recycling tires into road-building material, called Crumb Rubber Modified Bitumen, is extremely energy-intensive because of the high temperatures needed to process the rubber. However, it generates considerably lower carbon dioxide emissions than regular asphalt and makes the road more durable.