Sekhar Research Innovations Sdn Bhd

Today, over half the recovered end of life tires in the World are incinerated in low end and unhealthy applications like TDF (tire derived fuel). The argument for burning tires has been that no alternative exists that can consume the huge volume of waste tires generated yearly. Technology has now caught up with the scrap tire problem, effectively ending the need to burn this valuable raw material as low grade fuel. Thank you to Discovery Channel for featuring SRI as a leading tire recycling company with the potential to address this solid waste issue with technology and innovation.

..processing an old tire back into a new one remains extremely difficult. The production process alters the materials’ properties, making them hard to reclaim. So far, tire recycling hasn’t been able to produce significant amounts of affordable, high-performance compounds. Sekhar Research Innovations (SRI) is a startup based in the Malaysian city Petaling Jaya. They say their patent-pending technological process can devulcanize rubber from whole scrap tires, creating a compound that can be used to make new tires, retread old ones, and make automotive parts.The technology can work at high volumes and requires very little energy, says SRI.. “Ours is the first closed-loop rubber recycling solution that can match the volume requirements of rubber manufacturing.”

This fall, consulting firm Frost and Sullivan gave the company a technology innovation of the year award for their tire recycling process. “Large-scale implementation of SRI’s recycling technology could ultimately lead to greener, ecofriendly cars on our roads,” the firm stated. Currently the company is in the process of commercializing its process and plans to open a production facility in Malaysia.

Continue reading at Discovery.com

Sekhar Research Innovations (SRI) has been awarded the 2010 Asia Pacific Technology Innovation Award for Tire Recycling Technology by Frost & Sullivan. SRI received the Asia Pacific award in recognition of its performance against key competitors in terms of uniqueness of technology, impact on new products/applications, functionality, customer value and the relevance of SRI’s innovation to the tire recycling industry.

Frost & Sullivan’s Technology Innovation of the Year Award is bestowed upon a company that has carried out new research, which has resulted in the development of a specific innovative technology that has or is expected to bring significant contributions to the industry in terms of adoption, change, and competitive posture. This award recognizes the quality and depth of a company’s research and development program as well as the vision and risk-taking that enabled it to undertake such an endeavor.

SRI is honored to receive this prestigious award. We thank Frost & Sullivan for recognizing the disruptive potential of our technology and its significance as a milestone in the Asia Pacific cleantech industry.

PDF of notification from Frost & Sullivan to SRI

Sekhar Research Innovations CEO, Gopinath B. Sekhar

See coverage on Bernama, New Straits Times, The Edge, and European Rubber Journal

PRESS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

SEKHAR RESEARCH INNOVATIONS ANNOUNCES THE WORLD’S

FIRST COMMERCIALLY VIABLE TIRE RECYCLING TECHNOLOGY

Malaysian company makes landmark ‘disruptive clean technology’ announcement for rubber compound production; Announces plans for global expansion

12 May 2010, KUALA LUMPUR, MALAYSIA: SEKHAR RESEARCH INNOVATIONS SDN BHD (“SRI”), a leading developer of cleantech solutions for tire recycling technologies, today announced the world’s first commercially viable recycling solution that addresses the problem of scrap tires globally.

SRI is focused on making a difference with a viable solution that is cost effective, volume based, value added and compatible with existing rubber manufacturing equipment and processes.

“SRI’s technology will fundamentally change the landscape of rubber manufacturing and tire waste management, as we know it today.  For the first time scrap tire material can be utilized in substantial proportions in the manufacture of premium rubber goods, such as tires,” said Gopinath B. Sekhar, Chief Executive Officer, Sekhar Research Innovations Sdn Bhd.

Globally, there are in excess of 1 billion tires produced yearly, valued at more than USD 130 billion. These very same tires, when they reach end of life, pose a global public health and solid waste management problem. Across Europe and United States the majority are burnt for fuel (“TDF”) or used in roads and similar low-end applications. In Asia, end of life tires (“ELT”) routinely disposed of in landfills or irresponsible manner that has a negative impact on the health and the environment of the surrounding communities.

“For lack of an alternative, these low end and toxic practices have been wrongly accepted as sound solid waste management. By products of burning tires for fuel include harmful emissions and contamination of fresh water sources,” said Sekhar. “What we have today is a solution that makes these end of life tires a valuable industrial raw material for premium rubber products such as new and retread tires. This is good for the environment, the economy and the consumer!”

A 100% Malaysian company, SRI has been developing its proprietary solutions since 2006, having invested more than RM 3 million to date. The proprietary SRI Activation Technology has successfully produced compounds that are currently being tested and evaluated by leading global tire manufacturers. Locally, SRI is involved in ongoing evaluations and road testing trials with the Rubber Research Institute of Malaysia.

SRI Compound Masterbatch (MB) is derived from the recycling of scrap tire rubber that has been devulcanized and converted into raw material rubber compound.  The primary input material for our process is 40 mesh (less than 0.42mm) crumb rubber from ordinary whole car and truck tires.

In two months, SRI will produce 50 metric tons of SRI Compound Masterbatch per month at our present test facility located in Malaysia.

This initial production will be targeted towards the retread tire and general rubber goods market, and is expected to generate revenues in excess of RM 2 million per annum.

“In the meantime we are finalizing sites for a full size production facility in Port Klang which is expected to be operational by the end of this year. This plant will produce approximately 20,000 metric tons of SRI Compound Masterbatch annually and represents an investment of RM 35 million. This facility, targeting the demands of Malaysia and ASEAN markets, will generate revenues in excess of RM 80 million per annum,” said Sekhar.

As part of SRI’s global expansion strategy, it has a licensee in the United States for the eventual production of SRI Compound Masterbatch. Similar agreements are underway in Europe and Asia.

“Tire manufacturing is a demanding and highly competitive industry and any savings in raw material costs – even one percent – is a significant gain. What we are offering here is a solution that provides a savings of between four to eight percent in terms of raw material cost.  Given that profit margins in the industry are uniformly less than 10 percent, this has the potential to double profits!” Sekhar said.

For more information on Sekhar Research Innovations Sdn Bhd and SRI Compound Masterbatch please visit www.srielastomers.com.

PDF copy of this release

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ABOUT SEKHAR RESEARCH INNOVATIONS (“SRI”)

SRI is a research and development cleantech company focused on providing solutions to the growing challenge posed by the need to recycle tires. It is currently using its Activation Process to produce next generation rubber recycling solutions in the form of SRI Compound Masterbatch and SRI Activation Technology, processing aids and advanced state-of-the-art equipment for the global market.

For enquiries:

Anthony Umann

Sekhar Research Innovations

t: +6.03.7957.6777 / +6.012.6174.050

e: anthony@srielastomers.com

This video shows another example of the SRI post activation process.

The significance here is that recycled content, converted to compound in the form of SRI Compound Masterbatch, has been successfully used to replace virgin rubber compound in this application (retread) in proportions of up to 20% without any appreciable loss in properties or performance. This directly translates to immediate raw material savings of between 5% to 7%  and potentially substantial consumption in a high volume, highly competitive application.

The full report is available as PDF here

SRI is today introducing The SRI Activation System. For the first time ever,  an industrial Cleantech process exists that can address the challenge of volume processing for the global tire recycling industry in a viable, cost effective and environmentally friendly manner. This video features a full scale SRI Activated Compound production batch that was run at a size of 250 kilograms . This represents commercial scale production capability on a modular level.  Since then, SRI having cleared the laboratory and testing phase and moved to the commercialization of our process has successfully tested the process at its optimum operating capacity of 350kg per batch allowing for a production capacity of more than 1 metric ton per hour per activator.

SRI’s proprietary machine effectively devulcanizes 40 mesh tire crumb in a mechano chemical process. The system allows for a batch size in excess of 250kg with a very low energy footprint, low heat signature and a process time of under 20 minutes per batch. Having achieved this milestone, production will begin shortly in both Malaysia and the USA with the equipment being shipped this month.

Light truck tires manufactured using SRI Compound Masterbatch have successfully cleared the 5,000 km mark under normal commercial road conditions while carrying maximum payload. Reaching this very significant benchmark means that from this point forward the evaluation process will be identical to that of a normal production tire. SRI has achieved an industry first as no other comparable material has previously qualified at this level.  These road test results show very similar wear patterns even down to axel related variations and have thus far cleared the evaluation process without issue. Having crossed the 10,000 km threshold, we await official measurement results and will be publishing them in due course.

Click the image above to download the full results

SRI’s CEO, Gopi Sekhar was recently interviewed by Karamjit Singh of The Edge, a financial and investment weekly publication here in Malaysia. The following is an excerpt.

One of the biggest environmental problems plaguing the world is the estimated one billion tyres lying in dumps around the world. The tyres cannot be easily disposed of or recycled and lie in massive dumps — some up to six football fields deep — leaking chemicals into the ground. Some catch fire spectacularly. These fires do not burn out easily. YouTube has videos showing tyre dumps on fire, spewing out thick black smoke and flames. The fires will last for days, the smoke for years. One tyre dumpsite was simmering deep in its bowels, releasing smoke for five incredible years.

“It is a common occurrence,” says Gopi Sekhar, CEO of SRI, who nonetheless believes he has found the solution to the rising mountains of discarded tyres around the world. He and his research team have created a compound which goes into making retread tires. More importantly, a light tyre for trucks, which was made with more than 14% recycled rubber, has been independently validated and tested by the Rubber Research Institute (RRI) of the Malaysian Rubber Board. The RRI noted that the performance of the tyre made by SRI was even better than that of a tyre made of virgin rubber.

An ecstatic Gopi welcomes the RRI validation. “What we have here is nothing less than the solution to the global tyre and rubber scrap problem. It will address not only the annual accumulation [of tyres] but also the backlog in the landfills. The introduction of SRI Compound Masterbatch as an industrial raw material effectively means cost-effective value-added consumption, which will make it irresistible as a green raw material. We believe that this is the future of global rubber recycling,” he says.

The rest of the article can be read at The Edge

RRI inspecting inspecting light truck tire

SRI is pleased to announce 2,500km mark of the RRI on the road validation trials of our light truck tires  has been passed successfully. The RRI results confirm no appreciable difference in abrasion resistance and performance to date. SRI will be clearing the 5,000km mark in the coming week. This is a significant performance marker for new tires. SRI now expects to quickly progress through the protocol so that we may carry out the required tests with European Light truck compounds.