How car tires drive deforestation | DW Documentary

Rainforests are sacrificed to provide the rubber used in tires, even though alternatives exist. 70% of the global rubber harvest goes to the tire industry, which must now meet new supply chain rules approved by the European Parliament in April 2024.

The rules are designed to ensure due diligence and corporate accountability. Once the law takes effect, manufacturers in the EU will need to show their tires do not contain natural rubber from deforested land. The likes of Continental and Michelin will be obliged to make their supply chains more transparent. This certification process poses a problem for producers. Most natural rubber is produced in Asia. The supply chains from rubber farmers through various intermediaries to Europe have, however, been largely nontransparent to date. Companies are therefore exploring alternative materials and methods.

Tire manufacturer Pirelli, for example, is working with sustainable producers in Thailand. Michelin is testing high-tech tires to increase the service life of its products. And Continental, in cooperation with a leading German research institute, is looking into a raw material that could act as a substitute: the Russian dandelion. If cultivated on a large scale in Europe, it could help offset the demand for natural rubber. In addition, discarded old tires could be retreaded, recycled, and put back on the market – instead of ending up on a landfill site. Is the industry having a genuine change of heart, or are these merely examples of greenwashing?

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Tropical rainforests are under threat, with more and more of them being cleared to make room for rubber plantations. Because rubber is a key component of car tires. If we don’t change our mobility, the demand for rubber will increase strongly. Could the rise of electric vehicles help to turn the tide? Tires are getting larger and larger What are tire manufacturers doing to help stop deforestation for the sake of plantations? And are there viable alternatives to natural rubber from the tropics? Thailand’s tropical climate is perfect for growing a raw material coveted the world over. It’s 5 a.m., and farmer Satit Promraksa is already at work, harvesting natural rubber. Seven years after being planted, a rubber tree has an annual yield of 1.5 kilograms. People have been making use of this tree sap for over 3,000 years, beginning with indigenous peoples like the Maya in Central America. At the end of the 19th century, the British began planting the trees in their Asian colonies. Scraping rubber makes me happy. It’s a tradition passed down from one generation to the next My grandparents harvested rubber. I love my job I can feed my family with the money I earn. The milky white sap is also known as "latex." The resulting solid material has a number of unbeatable properties such as tear-resistance. Rubber trees thrive in tropical climates. They require lots of water and warm, humid conditions. Over 90% of the annual global rubber harvest 15 million tons is cultivated in Southeast Asia. The top producers are Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam, and India. Between 1993 and 2016, some four million hectares of rainforest were destroyed to make way for rubber plantations. That’s an area the size of Switzerland. 85% of production comes from smallholders, most on fewer than two hectares. Even ancient rainforests have been destroyed to make room for rubber plantations. Gone forever is the unique flora and fauna as well as the trees’ carbon-storing potential. Without rainforests, the Earth’s atmosphere will heat up even more rapidly. But some people are taking action to prevent further deforestation. We accompany Mai Loyen in southern Thailand. She’s fighting for the preservation of these precious ecosystems. It’s the gift that the generations have passed to us. We enjoy it. We maintain it and we take food out of it. And after that, we have to give back We would like the next generations to do the same. This tree is here giving them the same benefit that has benefited generations before. Mai Loyen is a conservationist and entrepreneur. She worked in the rubber industry for over 20 years and witnessed both the terrible working conditions for farmers and the destruction of rainforests Together with a friend, she founded "Agriac" in 2019 a cooperative uniting some 4,000 rubber farmers. They’re committed to a common goal: No more rainforests being sacrificed to cultivate rubber. Mai Loyen has dropped by to visit Satit Promraksa: one of the farmers who Agriac helps by negotiating better deals for them. The smallholders are working toward transforming existing monocultures in an eco-friendly and responsible way without pesticides or artificial fertilizers. Our approach is to have the most biodiversity in the monoculture plantations. For example: a plant like this is not only fixing the carbons inside, but is also a source of food as well. Besides rubber, the farmers harvest mushrooms for their own use. Satit Promraksa also keeps bees, then sells the honey at markets. The Agriac farmers are utilizing the land’s full potential supporting greater biodiversity than in a monoculture, which centers solely on yield. The global demand for rubber remains high, due in large part to the material’s versatility. Rubber is integrated into our everyday lives. It’s found in our backyards in hoses and gardening gloves. It’s used as flooring in hospitals and sports facilities. And it’s also found in everything from condoms to sponges, and rainboots. All told, some 50,000 products contain rubber. But most of the global harvest a whopping 70% goes toward making tires. There are now some 1.4 billion cars on the world’s roads. Demand is increasing and with it, the need for more tires. The Netherlands. A research team at Amsterdam’s Vrije Universiteit is examining land use in the tropics. Peter Verburg is a professor of environmental geography and a leading expert on how the global demand for cars impacts rainforests. People drive more kilometers, and we don’t see a transformation to less mobility. And if we look at countries like China, India and other upcoming economies, we see that their mobility is still far below the European level. And people are also buying bigger cars, bigger tires, needing more rubber. So if we don’t change our mobility, the demand for rubber will increase strongly, leading to more and more deforestation. In Germany, new car registrations are on the rise after a slump during the COVID-19 pandemic. Accordingly, the demand for tires is increasing too. The German Automobile Club or "ADAC" tests car tires at its technical center in Landsberg. The team here considers all manner of environmental issues. Because when it comes to tires, rubber is far from the only cause for concern. Rubber constitutes about 40% of the tire. There’s natural rubber from trees in rainforests and synthetic rubber derived from fossil fuels like crude oil. Another 30 percent is fillers, including the harmful powder carbon black. 13% is steel, for reinforcing the tire. Then there are toxic plasticizers. As the tire gets wear and tear, it releases environmentally harmful microplastics. Despite all that, billions of euros worth of tires are sold annually. Worldwide, an average of one in four people buy a tire every year. Stacked one on top of the other, the resulting tower would reach all the way to the moon. Many car drivers aren’t well-versed on what tires are made of. But manufacturers can’t plead ignorance. Are they serious about protecting the climate? Tires are getting larger and larger. This may stem from stricter requirements in terms of load index and speed rating. But it’s also because car manufacturers are purposely offering the option of larger tires, which customers can buy at a considerable premium. The safety gains are negligible. For mid-size cars like the Volkswagen Golf, carmakers actually sell tires that are far too big. Fifteen- or sixteen-inch tires are perfectly suitable compromising neither safety nor drivability. But the VW Golf is also sold with 17, 18, and 19 inch tires. For every additional inch, the weight of the tire increases by 400 to 500 grams. And that means more rubber from the tropics. Consumers who value protecting the rainforest should opt for smaller tires, which need less rubber. But they’re not the only party involved said If we look at SUVs and other large vehicles 22 or 23-inch tires are not uncommon these days. And there’s no technical justification for that tire size. Even these larger vehicles that have an unladen weight Of 2 or 2.5 tons drive just fine with smaller tires. Looking at adverts from major German automakers, small e-cars with small tires are nowhere to be found. Whether Audi, BMW, or Mercedes the top manufacturers all want to sell the biggest and most expensive vehicles with maximum power. But does that help the goal of protecting the climate and the rainforests? The ADAC performs a comparison test of different tires and vehicle classes. Representing the luxury segment is this SUV. Also lining up is a compact class model… and this car for the economy class. On the plus side, all three are e-vehicles and don’t emit CO2. But the batteries make them a lot heavier. And because they need more braking power, the tires wear out faster and are replaced more often. Tesla’s Model Y is one of the best-selling e-vehicles and representative of a lot of today’s SUVs. It weighs two tons, has 300 horsepower, and can accelerate from 0 to 100 kilometers per hour in under 7 seconds. And it comes with large wheels that support the vehicle’s weight. It’s not exactly the embodiment of climate protection. The Renault Megane has 200 horsepower. The ADAC expert says the vehicle’s 20-inch tires are far too big. Here we have a typical example of a small car, which has a curb weight of 1.3 tons, 90 horsepower, and small 15-inch tires. It’s a practical alternative in e-mobility. And this very vehicle, the Volkswagen e-Up, is being discontinued. Why? Environmentally conscious buyers looking for a small e-car are often shopping in vain. A recent ADAC study found there are only three e-cars on the German market for under 15,000 euros. So, what is the role of tiremakers in all of this? Are they working towards producing tires that contain less natural rubber? One of the world’s leading manufacturers is Michelin, headquartered in the French city of Clermont-Ferrand. Its range includes tires over 20-inches in diameter, exclusively for the luxury class. Michelin’s innovation communication director says it is simply responding to market demand. It’s safety, but also comfort equipment that is more and more present in car. So cars get heavier. And if they get heavier: for safety distance, you have to have bigger brakes. And bigger brakes means also bigger tires. So you need much more rubber. In terms of weight for the tires: yes, we need more rubber. And that’s why it’s also important for us to continue to innovate, to decrease the amount of rubber that we put in the same tire, to deliver the same performance. One way to reduce the usage of rubber is to increase the service life of the product. That’s what Michelin is researching at its testing center. On average, tires last about 40,000 kilometers. Michelin is looking at developing tires that wear out less while driving. We created the system to be able to take an aspiration at the exit of the tire to be able to capture the particles during driving. We did that because we wanted to keep improving the wear performance of a tire. The longer you last on the road, the less tires you have to make. So, it’s very important to understand the basic mechanisms of wear and then to design the best components, the best compounds. The developers consider a multitude of factors: Different road surfaces, speeds, and vehicles. Michelin has invested millions of euros into high-tech tires. But wouldn’t it be simpler to develop a type of material that could replace natural rubber from rainforests? Compared to what we use today in terms of proportion, it cannot be significantly reduced. Because of the unique properties of natural rubber. Unless between now and 2030, we discover a magical material that can replace natural rubber. But in fact a raw material that has the potential to replace natural rubber already exists. For now, though, there’s still that dependence on rubber. Manufacturers like Michelin have undertaken to do more on the sustainability front. That includes not buying any rubber from newly deforested land. But an incident in Indonesia cast doubt on its commitment. In this video from 2017, Michelin is promoting a flagship project to protect rainforests. It was geared toward potential investors. In spring 2018, the tire company raked in funding based on the promise that together with Indonesian partners, it would cultivate sustainable rubber tree plantations. The site is located on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, in the province of Jambi. The project was heralded as a green investment and financed with so-called “green bonds.” The aim was to protect local nature and biodiversity. Michelin later claimed the site had been "ravaged by uncontrolled and illegal deforestation and fires" without its knowledge. But in November 2022, the media cooperative Voxeurop, spurred by a report from the environmental organization Mighty Earth, uncovered a more complicated reality. We talked to Mighty Earth’s Alex Wijeratna and satellite expert, Leo Bottrill. I wanted to know what happened in the past, so I found all the satellite images from around 2012. I overlayed that image with the concession maps in my software. And that image was lower resolution, but I could see that the deforestation had been caused by an industrial actor. I could see very large areas of land and forest had been cleared, which indicated that someone had specifically cleared this area for the purpose of planting something. And I assumed: rubber. The journalists and conservationists zeroed in on one critical question: Did Michelin know about the industrial deforestation, or had the company been duped? In the video, Michelin promised investors a sustainable and lucrative green investment. Our evidence really shows that Michelin knew that its local partner had really cleared and deforested this very high-conservation value forests and landscapes in Jambi. They knew this, but they didn’t tell the market. They didn’t tell their investors when they went looking for $95 million worth of green bonds. And that was the big deception and we’ve been trying to highlight that ever since. How would Michelin respond to the serious allegation? Our interview at the company’s Bangkok office was canceled at short notice. In an email, Michelin claimed that the legally or illegally deforested land amounted to less than 4% of the concession areas. And emphasized: All parties involved in the project were aware. Michelin has prohibited all forms of illegal deforestation and was able to achieve this goal in a very short time, given the immense operational challenges The satellite images you refer to are irrelevant for examining the dynamics of the project That matter aside, all tire companies face a rocky road ahead. A new EU law regulating supply chains will take effect at the end of 2024. Manufacturers like Michelin will need to prove in detail where their rubber is sourced and verify that no rainforest was cleared for the purpose of cultivation after the year 2021. But how will these rules be enforced? Verifying where rubber originates is not without its challenges. At least at the early morning harvest, there’s no question where the tree sap is from. Afterwards, farmers bring their harvest to collection points in this case, to Agriac. The cooperative guarantees that the rubber only comes from plantations on land that was not newly deforested. But Agriac is the exception rather than the rule. And therein lies the first problem of making the supply chain more transparent. The rubber from farmers in the surrounding area is tossed on one big pile. Linking it to a single plantation is no longer possible. These rubber balls are also called "cup lump rubber.” It’s what forms when the liquid latex from the trees isn’t preserved with ammonia within the first two hours. It coagulates. A farmer will earn the equivalent of 1 euro 20 cents for every kilogram of cup lump. The market’s changed. Before, the customers wanted liquid latex. Now more and more cup lump rubber is being exported to Europe. That makes it easier on farmers, because they no longer need ammonia. The main reason behind the change? Cup lump rubber is used for tire production. First, the rubber balls are dried in the courtyard of the cooperative. Behind these huge doors, rubber is being treated in another way for eventual use in tire production. The cabinets contain sheets of pressed latex. One kilogram is derived from about 60 cups of sap from the morning harvest. Heat is used to extract water over the next three days. A farmer earns about 1 euro 60 cents for a sheet of rubber. And it takes a little more than one sheet to make a car tire. The rubber is transported via truck to factories. What arrives here has usually already passed through a number of intermediaries. There’s not the slightest chance of identifying what came from where. Samples are brought to a lab to test the quality of the latex. Then, large centrifuges separate water and impurities from the latex. Workers then have to clean the sticky mass from the machines. Finally, the milky sap is stored in silos. This current system is incompatible with the new EU regulations. Determining which plantation the latex started from would be impossible. Mai Loyen from Agriac is visiting today. She has an agreement with the manager of the rubber factory, guaranteeing that a certain silo will be reserved exclusively for the rubber from her cooperative’s farmers. If all the supply chains are linked together and we can shorten the intermediate in between, we can directly identify the farmer. What we are working for is in the form of a cooperative. They are farming themselves and they manage the collecting center. And if we give opportunities to the cooperative, to link directly to the factories, the intermediate is very short. Tracking the rubber of the Agriac 4,000 farmers in this fashion complies with the new EU rules. But this level of transparency is not realistic for most of Thailand’s 1.7 million rubber farmers. That’s also why tire producers are seeking out alternatives: to protect the rainforest AND guarantee a transparent supply chain. Researchers at Germany’s renowned Fraunhofer Institute are working on this objective in collaboration with tire giant Continental. Their solution: Russian dandelions. Could this supposed weed be the raw material for the tires of the future? This is a young root of the dandelion. That’s where most of the natural rubber is concentrated. The roots need to be cleaned before further processing. The long rubbery threads are already visible. The raw material is then fed into a machine where the water is squeezed out over several hours. Over in the lab, researchers are crossing different generations of the dandelion. With the help of genetic engineering, the aim is to breed plants with larger roots to ultimately increase yields. Back to the dandelion roots. After all the water is squeezed out, what’s left is pure rubber. It’s treated to prevent ageing, then dried, and lastly stored for later production. This here is the raw rubber. Its chemical composition is comparable to that of natural rubber from the rubber tree. This polymer has a high molecular weight, and it’s very long so it has terrific properties in terms of elasticity. Perfect for car tires! For car and bicycle tires. One advantage is that dandelions can thrive in poor-quality soils. To meet the demand for natural rubber in Germany, it would require a cultivation area about twice the size of Berlin. Continental already makes bicycle tires out of dandelion rubber. But in the next decade, it wants to produce car tires on an industrial scale too. That’s the time the company needs to set up its production facilities. So, it will still be a while before German-grown dandelions can relieve the pressure on rainforests in Southeast Asia. But there is currently an alternative. Every year, about 600,000 tons of old tires are discarded. Why not recycle them into new tires? In other words – retreading. German company King Meiler specializes in just that. The company buys old, worn-out tires where the framework or "carcass" is still intact. The tires are inspected for damage, with defective ones being removed. Then, a machine strips off the tire’s old rubber. Can you think of another product that’s disposed of after only 30% of it has been used? There aren’t many products like that in the world, but that’s how it is with tires. You buy tires that have a tread depth of, say, eight millimeters that’s a winter tire. A summer tire is usually only six millimeters. And the tire is driven down to a maximum of 1.6 millimeters before being thrown away. But 70% of the material still remains, and we make use of that. Most used tires are incinerated in the process emitting a lot of greenhouse gases. At King Meiler, they’re given a new tread. This is the only part of the setup that requires fresh rubber. The tire is then vulcanized at around 165 degrees Celsius. The old part of the tire is fully welded to the new one. More than 46 million tires are sold every year in Germany. Retreaded car tires are still a niche product. Their share of the overall market is just one percent. But there’s a chance this could change with the new EU law. We see ourselves in competition with the secondary brands of premium manufacturers. We’re more focused on the European producers and not necessarily in competition with the very cheap tires made in Asia. We have different standards for our product, so we can’t always compete, price-wise. One way to dramatically increase the retreaded market share would be to require manufacturers to take back and recycle their used tires. But at the moment, that doesn’t look likely. Tire manufacturers rely on natural rubber. But this project in Thailand shows that rainforests do not need to be cut down to produce it. At this research site, scientists are growing pepper using an ancient native variety. Their goal is higher-yielding plants. Mai Loyen from Agriac is meeting with the researchers. The pepper is not meant to replace rubber trees, but rather to be a supplemental crop on existing plantations. Selling it could bring in additional income for the farmers. The extension of the land is leading to deforestation. So if they were satisfied with the piece of land they already have, that’s the most profitable for everybody. On top of that: pepper may be one of the options that you could choose. So that’s why we have to work with the university to have the best model of it, to have the best yeild which economically makes sense. Thailand is the largest exporter of rubber in the world. With her cooperative, Mai Loyen is proving a more sustainable way is possible. Perhaps this will inspire others to protect the rainforests and the climate.