Sustainable Development Goals
PROJECT INFORMATION AT A GLANCE:
Project Status:
Completed pilot; decommissioned
Organizations Involved:
Fountain Tire, FIRST, Tire Stewardship BC, Artech Shredders, Tire Remanufacturers, Tire Retreaders & Equipment Suppliers
Services / Equipment:
Design & Engineering, Supply Chain Management, Packaged Solutions
Klean funded and built the operation, sold the products and demonstrated an integrated business that required no disposal fees.
Klean’s Mobius project put tire retreading and circular manufacturing into practice. Klean funded and built a tire-remanufacturing plant with 12 tire mould presses, capable of producing up to 20 tire sizes, and combined it with a 20-tonne-per-day pyrolysis plant. Remanufactured tires were sold locally. Unsuitable casings were shredded into crumb for pyrolysis, and the recovered products were also sold into local markets.
The achievement reached beyond equipment operation. Klean demonstrated how preserving casing value and recovering the remaining materials could support a tire-recycling business without requiring disposal fees. The same integrated logic underpins Klean’s commercial model: $8.6 million in annual revenue from one million tires, with 10% of the tires generating approximately 48% of that revenue through remanufacturing.
For investors, fleets and tire businesses, this experience changes the investment question: how much value can the whole operation capture from every incoming tire?
Klean spent one year surveying the public directly, gathering real tire-buyer feedback on what mattered in a purchasing decision. The remanufacturing plant focused on common sizes used by fleets, passenger vehicles and light trucks. The commercial work connected manufacturing capability with an understanding of the customer who would buy the finished tire.
Klean also partnered with major tire retailers for feedstock supply and new-tire sales, developed a tire-stewardship plan and advised the British Columbia government on regulatory changes needed to support the approach. These activities addressed the supply, market and policy conditions around the plant as well as the machinery inside it.
Klean identifies Mobius as a pioneering integration of tire remanufacturing, pyrolysis and local product sales that had not previously been achieved elsewhere in this form. Its practical value lies in bringing those activities together in an operating business: manufacture another tire life from a suitable casing, then recover the material value from casings that cannot return to service.
Approximately 75% of a tire’s resource cost is invested in its casing. Destroying a serviceable casing sacrifices that manufactured value. Retreading preserves it, replacing the worn tread while extending the use of the original structure and materials.
Klean’s project assessment identifies three to five uses for suitable, undamaged casings and estimates that approximately 25% of scrap tires could be candidates for remanufacturing or retreading. Its commercial model uses a 10% allocation. Inspection determines which incoming casings qualify.
At Mobius, that value hierarchy shaped the operation. Suitable casings became saleable remanufactured tires. Unsuitable casings were shredded, and the crumb fed the integrated pyrolysis plant. The resulting products were sold locally, creating revenue from material that could no longer deliver another tire life.
This is the basis of Klean’s financial and environmental case for integration: preserve the product for as long as it can serve its purpose, then recover its materials for further use. Each additional casing life reduces the need to manufacture a replacement casing, while pyrolysis recovers carbon and oil from the remaining rubber.
Klean’s published Mobius model allocates 100,000 tires to remanufacturing and retreading: 60,000 passenger tires and 40,000 light-truck or commercial tires. The remaining 900,000 tires enter the pyrolysis stream.
| Revenue stream | Tires per year | Revenue per tire | Annual revenue |
|---|---|---|---|
| Passenger tire remanufacturing | 60,000 | $35 | $2,100,000 |
| Light-truck / commercial remanufacturing | 40,000 | $50 | $2,000,000 |
| Tire pyrolysis | 900,000 | $5 | $4,500,000 |
| Integrated Mobius total | 1,000,000 | $8.60 avg. | $8,600,000 |
Klean demonstrated the integrated business through operation and local sales. This table presents its commercial model at one million tires annually: gross revenue before operating and capital costs, using the original model’s dollar denomination. It is distinct from the pilot’s recorded turnover.
Ten percent of the tires generate approximately 48% of the modeled revenue. The 100,000 remanufactured tires contribute $4.1 million; pyrolysis of the remaining 900,000 contributes another $4.5 million. The table shows why identifying and preserving reusable casings is a major commercial decision before a tire reaches a reactor.
The Process Example below illustrates this integrated approach at 60,000 tonnes per year. Using a passenger tire equivalent (PTE) of 10 kg, this represents six million PTEs. Applying Klean’s revenue assumptions on that common PTE basis gives $51.6 million in illustrative annual revenue: $24.6 million from remanufacturing and $27 million from TPO and rCB, excluding revenue from optional routes, steel and textile fluff. Each market has its own tire mix, product prices and operating costs. Klean’s know-how comes from funding, building and operating the integrated business — and knowing how to bring tire selection, processing and product sales together for that market. Engaging Klean brings that experience into the project before equipment is selected and capital committed.
Mobius extends circularity beyond casing reuse. Klean’s recovered carbon black can return to rubber and tire manufacturing, with applications in plastic masterbatch production. Upgrading is part of that proposition: the objective is a specified material that manufacturers can use, rather than simply producing a carbon-rich residue.
Klean’s product-value model typically assigns approximately 60% of the recovered carbon-and-oil value to recovered carbon black (rCB) and 40% to recovered fuel oil (however in 2026 these values are closer to 50/50), though the exact split varies with the marketplace. This split is separate from the 10%/90% allocation of incoming tires and illustrates why product finishing and downstream applications are central to the integrated business.
Klean reports 35–40% biobased content in the recovered oil, originating from the natural rubber in the tire feedstock. That property creates a route into refining as a biogenic blendstock for road and marine fuels, and into blending with carbon black oil for the manufacture of new carbon black incorporating biogenic carbon. The reported percentage describes biobased content; finished fuel is produced through the appropriate downstream processing and specification requirements.
The resulting manufacturing loop preserves usable casings, recovers materials from exhausted tires and returns those materials to industrial supply chains. It combines product-life extension with the recovery of carbon, oil and metals that would otherwise lose their material value through combustion.
Klean demonstrated the integrated economics without requiring disposal fees. Its low-cost leadership strategy captured value through tire remanufacturing and recovered-product sales, giving the business a commercial foundation independent of a disposal charge.
That changes the competitive position of a recycler. Greater value recovered from each incoming tire creates more room to secure supply. Klean’s integrated proposition extends that advantage to paying for feedstock and competing for it on the strength of product revenues, rather than depending on a tire-stewardship levy to support the business.
The financial and environmental arguments reinforce each other. Preserving a casing protects the resources already invested in manufacturing it. Recovering carbon, oil and metals from exhausted tires keeps materials in productive use. Klean’s conclusion from Mobius is that integrating these activities offers the strongest combined financial and environmental approach to tire recycling.
Klean’s broader deployment vision extends that approach across a network capable of avoiding millions of tonnes of carbon emissions and creating thousands of jobs. The operating experience and commercial model provide the foundation for evaluating that opportunity at a larger scale.
1. Klean invested in and operated the integrated business.
Twelve mould presses, capability for up to 20 tire sizes and a 20-tonne-per-day pyrolysis plant connected tire remanufacturing with material recovery. Products from both activities were sold locally.
2. Preserving casings transforms the revenue mix.
In Klean’s one-million-tire model, the 10% remanufacturing stream generates $4.1 million of the $8.6 million annual revenue.
3. The operation demonstrated economics without disposal fees.
Klean’s experience encompasses manufacturing, product sales, retailer partnerships, consumer research and stewardship development - the commercial system around the plant.
Further operating and commercial insights from Klean’s work are available through an engagement tailored to your project.
Before committing capital to a tire-recycling plant, establish how much of your feedstock can earn another tire life and how to capture the value in the remainder. That choice shapes the equipment, product mix, supply strategy and revenue potential of the business.
Klean brings direct experience of funding, building and operating that integrated approach. Engage Klean early to apply those lessons to your tire supply, existing assets and target markets, and define the right business before selecting the machinery.
A paid Detailed Equipment Quotation (DEQ) translates a defined project into an initial equipment configuration and cost basis. Where project definition is needed first, Klean can scope that work. Development then progresses through a Detailed Feasibility Study (DFS), followed by Front-End Engineering Design (FEED).
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ABOUT THE INFORMATION PRESENTED
This case draws on Klean’s operating experience, product results and commercial model. Revenue projections describe the stated model and scale assumptions. Detailed project records and proprietary information are available through an agreed engagement, subject to confidentiality and client permissions.
This project addresses the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by considering the goals and associated targets illustrated by the WBCSD’s Tire Industry Project (TIP). TIP provides a framework for action that outlines impactful pathways for the tire sector to contribute to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). To learn more about how Klean’s approach, solutions, and technologies contribute to advancing the SDGs, please review the report “Sustainability Driven: Accelerating Impact with the Tire Sector SDG Roadmap”.
