Green energy from old tyres

RECYCLING: PRIZE FOR SA ENGINEER

Found ways to use scrap tyres to produce and store energy.

The remaining carbon black is very difficult to recycle or reuse but Badenhorst uses it to construct a type of solar panel.

According to Badenhorst, carbon black and graphite are combined in layers. This acts as the solar panel absorbing energy from the sun. “It produces enough energy for household consumption,” he said. It would thus heat water for washing in a geyser.

Although it does not yet generate enough energy for electricity, Badenhorst believes it is possible in the near future. “We need to think about what is the most viable and cheapest way to produce this energy,” he said.

Currently the rays hitting the panel are not producing enough energy for electricity. “One solution could be a type of magnifying glass to concentrate the sun’s rays on the panel,” he said.

What makes his idea unique is the way the energy is stored. Salts slowly melt in a container as the solar panel collects energy from the sun. “It works like a battery. You can use the energy stored in the liquid salts whenever you BREAKTHROUGH. Heinrich Badenhorst, a researcher at the University of Pretoria, developed a green energy source that produces and stores energy by using chopped up tyres and the sun. There are 60 million to 100 million scrap tyres in South Africa. Picture: Christine Vermooten. want to,” he said.

According to the Recycling and Economic Development Initiative of South Africa, about 11 million new tyres are sold annually, and there is a stockpile of between 60 million and 100 million scrap tyres in the country.

Badenhorst hopes his sustainable energy model will in the long run reduce the number of unused old tyres.

Badenhorst recently travelled to Germany for the Green Talents competition, where he met various scientists, economists and architects with the same future vision of a clean and green earth. “I met with scientists from DLR, they are the German equivalent of Nasa and we shared ideas,” he said.

Badenhorst says the ideas for sustainable energy in developed countries will not work in developing countries. “There are many materials we can’t use because they are either too expensive or too valuable and will be stolen.”

He hopes that within the next three to five years rural households in South Africa will be powered by this energy model.