Euro 7 Could Reshape the EU Tire Market
Tire Abrasion Emissions
New European rules limiting particulate emissions from tire abrasion could withdraw nearly half of today’s tyres from the EU market, industry association Tyres Europe warns.
A Global First
Euro 7 is the first legislation anywhere in the world to regulate and set standards for particulate emissions from tire abrasion. Tyres Europe secretary general Adam McCarthy outlined the impact at The Tire Cologne expo, held in Cologne, Germany, noting that an abrasion threshold for passenger car tires was agreed at the United Nations in Geneva and will now be transposed into European legislation within months.
Health and Environmental Context
The rules respond to concern that non-exhaust emissions are an increasingly important health and environmental risk, with nearly 500,000 tonnes of particulate matter produced from tyre abrasion every year across the European Union. As tailpipe emissions have fallen, tyre wear has become a larger share of the particulate burden on roads, which is why regulators are extending emission limits beyond the engine for the first time.
Two-Stage Limits
Regulators adopted a two-stage approach: an initial limit, followed five years later by tighter thresholds, with some specific allowances for certain tire types. The first stage allows an additional wear level of 0.22 grams of tire wear per kilometre per tonne of vehicle load, a figure that declines to 0.12 over the following years.
Timeline by Category
For C1 passenger car tires, the abrasion requirements are set to take effect from 1 July 2028, applying to all new types by that year and most existing types by 2030. For C2 commercial van and light truck tires, Euro 7 applies from 2030 and to existing types from 2032, while Tyres Europe has also begun work on C3 truck and bus tires within what it describes as an ambitious regulatory timeframe.
Market Impact
Tyres Europe calculates a 28% replacement rate in stage one, rising to 41% in phase two. The upshot, McCarthy said, is that of the tires on the market today, nearly 50% will have to be withdrawn because of Euro 7, reshaped by the first-ever abrasion standards.
Recycling The Tyres Euro 7 Retires
As Euro 7 pushes a large share of today’s tyres off the EU market, Klean Industries offers the recycling pathway for the worn and withdrawn tyres that follow, through tire pyrolysis and recovered carbon black (rCB) production. Its rCB replaces virgin carbon black in tyres, belts, hoses, plastics and inks, while its eight rCB plants in India demonstrate the technology at scale.
Learn More:
Recycle End-Of-Life Tyres
Tire pyrolysis and recovered carbon black turn end-of-life tyres into circular commodities instead of waste.
Klean Industries delivers tire pyrolysis and recovered carbon black plants, backed by feasibility studies and plant design and engineering.
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