Re-use of steel cord from tyres as reinforcement in sustainable construction

全球每年约有15亿条新轮胎由1000多万吨橡胶和优质钢丝帘线增强筋生产。目前，约有5%的这种原材料在制造过程中被浪费，并被焚烧或填埋。最近开发了一种新的工艺，将未硫化的橡胶从钢丝帘线中分离出来，使这两种成分都可以回收和重复使用。该项目专注于开发从这一过程中回收的钢丝帘线的高价值新应用，将其用作重载混凝土结构(如工业楼板和隧道衬砌)的纤维增强。为了实现这一点，首先需要研究改进回收过程，自动将绳索切割成预定长度，并将其整合到新浇注混凝土中，特别是通过湿法浇注、泵送或喷射来浇注。让废弃的钢丝绳作为混凝土中的钢筋获得第二次生命只需要大约制造新的钢纤维钢筋所需能量的4%，从而为改善建筑业的可持续性做出了重大贡献。

Approximately 1.5 billion new tyres are manufactured around the world every year from over 10 million tonnes of rubber and high quality steel cord reinforcement . About 5% of this raw material is currently wasted during manufacture and is disposed of by incineration or in landfill. A new process has recently been developed to separate the un-vulcanised rubber from the steel cord enabling both components to be recovered and re-used . This project focuses on developing new high value applications for the steel cord recovered from this process by using it as fibre reinforcement in heavily loaded concrete structures such as industrial floor slabs and tunnel linings. For this to be achieved, research is first required in to refining the recovery process, automatically cutting the cord in to predefined lengths and integrating it in to fresh concrete especialy designed for placement by either wet casting, pumping or spraying. Giving waste steel cord a second life as reinforcement in concrete only requires about 4% of the energy needed to manufacture new steel fibre reinforcement thereby making a significant contribution to improving the sustainability of the construction industry.