v>EPA
United States
Environmental Protection
Agency
Office of Solid Waste
and Emergency Response
(OS-305)
EPA/530-SW-91-045
June 1991
Office of Solid Waste
Environmental
Fact Sheet
EPA Guideline for Purchasing
Retread Tires
Managing Scrap Tires
In 1986, 220 million tires
were discarded in the
United States. Tires from
passenger cars and light
trucks accounted for ap-
proximately 80 percent of
the total, with the remain-
der being bus, truck, and off-
road tires. While scrap tires
often can be retreaded, sold
as used tires, or otherwise
reused or recycled, they are
typically discarded in land-
fills, tire stockpiles, and
along roadsides or water-
ways.
Tires create problems for
landfill managers because
they do not stay buried.
They rise fully or partly to
the surface causing uneven
settling of the landfill.
When they surface, they
provide homes for rodents
and mosquitoes.
Scrap tire piles present
similar problems and also
pose a serious threat; as fuel
for fires. When a four-
million-tire pile ignited in
Winchester, Virginia, it took
eight months to control the
fire at a cost to the federal
government alone of $1.2
million. There are approxi-
mately three billion tires in
piles in the U.S., and the
piles are increasing by 150
to 200 million tires per year.
State and local govern-
ments are using a number of
tools to manage the scrap
tire disposal problem. These
include increasing landfill
and tipping fees for tires,
banning tires from landfills,
restricting tires to monofills,
imposing taxes on new tires
to raise revenue for manag-
ing scrap tires, and building
waste-to-energy facilities to
burn tire chips.
Procurement Guideline
On November 17, 1988,
the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA)
issued a guideline for pur-
chasing retread tires. The
purpose of the guideline is to
use the stimulus of govern-
ment procurement to in-
crease the use of retread
tires within both govern-
ment and private sectors.
The guideline requires all
federal agencies and all
state and local government
agencies and contractors
that use federal funds to
purchase retread tires or
tire retreading services to
the maximum extent practi-
cable.
Recommended Retread
Tires Preference
The federal retread tires
guideline applies to pur-
chases of replacement
tires for automobiles, light
and heavy trucks and trail-
ers, buses, and off-road
vehicles. Original-equip-
ment tires are covered by
National Highway Traffic
Safety Administration regu-
lations, which require
manufacturers to equip
their new vehicles with new
tires. The guideline recom-
mends that agencies (1)
Printed on Recycled Paper
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obtain retreading services
for their used tires and (2)
purchase retread tires.
Obtaining Retreading
Retreading services can
be purchased in a number of
ways. Typically, the pur-
chasing agency specifies to
the retreading contractor
the type of tread desired.
The contractor may also be
asked to guarantee the
tread for a specified mileage,
with provisions included for
refunding a percentage of
the retreading cost, depend-
ing on the amount of tread
remaining when and if the
tire fails.
Purchasing Retread
Tires
All departments and
agencies in the Executive
Branch of the federal gov-
ernment except the Depart-
ment of Defense and the
U.S. Postal Service must use
the Greneral Service Admin-
istration (GSA) tire sched-
ule. They must order a
retread tire in lieu of a new
tire whenever a retread is
available on the schedule in
the size, load range, and
tread designation desired. If
any of these mandatory
users is granted a waiver
from GSA to purchase off
the schedule, the user must
consider purchasing a re-
tread tire or retreading
services over purchasing' a
new tire. Retread tires are
available from several
sources. Many retreaders
operate wholesale or retail
outlets from which retread
tires can be purchased.
These tires often carry the
same warranty as new tires.
Federal Regulation of
Retread Tires
All tires are regulated by
the National Highway Traf-
fic Safety Administration
through the Federal Motor
Vehicle Safety Standards
(FMVSS). The standard for
retreads, FMVSS 117, speci-
fies performance, labeling,
and certification require-
ments; its underlying pur-
pose is safety. The only
other regulation affecting
retreads is a prohibition on
the use of retreads on the
front wheels of buses.
Principal Federal
Procuring Agencies
The General Services
Administration (GSA) is the
lead federal agency for tire
specifications and tire pro-
curement. In November
1990, GSA revised its speci-
fications to include retread
replacement tires:
• ZZ-T-381: passenger car,
light-truck, and truck/bus
tires;
• ZZ-T-410: pneumatic in-
dustrial tires;
• ZZ-T-1083: low-speed,
off-road tires; and
• ZZ-T-1619: agricultural
tires.
GSA also prepared guide-
lines explaining how to
qualify retread tires, held
meetings with industry, and
conducted a tire workshop
for industry and federal user
agencies to discuss the new
specifications and tire test-
ing.
Upon completing its first
year of testing retread tires
for qualification under the
new ZZ-T-381 specification,
GSA published a qualified
products list. The list in-
cludes one light-truck bias
retreader, two light-truck
radial retreaders, and one
truck/bus radial retreader.
GSA's latest Federal Supply
Schedule 26 II contains
retreads for 70 of the tire
sizes/types, including six
light-truck radial retreads,
three light-truck bias re-
treads, and 61 truck/bus
radial retreads.
Further Information
For information about
GSA's specifications, the
tires qualified products list
(QPL), and QPL testing,
please contact the Federal
Tire Program at (703) 603-
1215. For information about
the Federal Supply Sched-
ule, the Federal Tire Pro-
gram may be reached at
(703)603-1227. For further
information about the EPA
guideline, including copies
of the guideline, you may
contact EPA's procurement
guidelines hotline at (703)
941-4452.
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