Continental is increasingly focusing on renewable and recycled materials in its tyre production. While the share of these materials averaged 26 percent in 2024, the tyre manufacturer expects an increase of two to three percentage points in 2025. By 2030, the share of renewable and recycled materials in Continental’s tyre production is set to rise to over 40 percent – while maintaining consistently high safety and performance standards. Carbon black and silica play a crucial role in this transformation because, alongside rubber, they make up a large proportion of the raw materials in tyre production. Both are fillers that make the rubber, for example in the tiye tread, resistant and are also responsible for essential tire quality characteristics such as grip and braking performance.
Continental obtains both materials in proportion from recycled or renewable sources in order to reduce resource consumption. Silica, a filler required to achieve optimal grip and reduced rolling resistance, can be obtained from rice husks instead of quartz sand. The husks are an agricultural by-product from the production of risotto rice, for example. For the raw material carbon black, Continental relies on three innovative processes. Firstly, carbon black can be produced from bio-based alternatives such as tall oil, a waste product from the paper industry, instead of crude oil. Secondly, it can be produced from recycled raw materials such as pyrolysis oil from end-of-life tyres. Thirdly, a particularly efficient pyrolysis process enables the recovery of carbon black directly from end-of-life tyres.
“Innovation and sustainability go hand in hand at Continental. Using silica from the ashes of rice husks in our tyres shows that we are breaking completely new ground – without compromising on safety, quality or performance,” says Jorge Almeida, head of Sustainability at Continental Tires.
Continental is increasingly using silica variants derived from the ashes of rice husks across its whole tyre portfolio. Rice husks are an agricultural by-product of the Asian agricultural industry and Italian risotto rice production. This type of silica is manufactured by Solvay in Italy, among others. Innovative processing methods are used to turn this agricultural by-product into silica. The method of production from biomass is more energy-efficient than conventional production processes. Silica from rice husk ash thus supports the circular economy and contributes to a more sustainable value chain. Traditionally, the raw material is obtained from quartz sand. Silica has been an important complement to carbon black as a filler in many tyre rubber components for around 30 years – Continental was an early pioneer of this innovative technology. Silica has revolutionised the safety and energy efficiency of tyres and played a crucial role in reducing braking distances by almost 50 percent. Just as importantly, using silica in tread compounds helps to reduce rolling resistance and therefore energy consumption and CO2 emissions. This highlights how the use of a more sustainable material such as silica in Continental’s tyre production can have a positive effect along the value chain.
