Nebraska Scrap Tire Processor Bales Out

A bitter dispute over scrap tires in Nebraska is coming to an end in Wisner, Neb., where hundreds of thousands of baled tires have been hauled off to landfills.

The conclusion of the fight between a scrap tire processor and state regulators reflects just how much has changed in the way Nebraska handles old tires.

The once-popular practice of using tire bales for everything from windbreaks to cattle pens - a business that Bill Miner had hoped to profit from - is over.

"I've been the poster child for the destruction of the scrap tire industry in Nebraska," Miner said. "It's sad."

Tire bales are formed by tightly compressing 100 tires and then binding them with wire. The result is a much smaller, one-ton rubber block that can be used to build walls and foundations.

Dave Haldeman of the Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality said the bales break apart, so any widespread use could lead to widespread problems.

"Tire baling is probably the most inexpensive way to get rid of tires, outside of a landfill," Haldeman said. "A lot that we saw really appeared to be more disposal activity as opposed to true recycling."

Loose tires provide a breeding ground for mosquitoes, which spread West Nile virus and other diseases. And tires pose a health threat if they catch on fire.

Nebraska has been on the leading edge of tire baling, said Michael Blumenthal of the Rubber Manufacturers Association. It was among the first to allow their use and, with that greater experience, has been among the earliest to prohibit their use.

Miner said the state could again be a leader, but in more sophisticated projects: road construction, bridge abutments and site development.

Miner took his fight to the Nebraska Supreme Court, where he lost. Now he's cleaning up, at a cost of about $300,000, what was once 1 million tires.

In the mid-1990s, some Nebraska property owners were doing anything they wanted with baled tires, and the bales accounted for 76 percent of the tires reused in the state.

By 2000, when Miner opened his business in Wisner, the market was shrinking as the state reined in the use of bales. The state, which had once funded projects using baled tires, was moving toward a law, adopted in 2003, that effectively banned their use.

Along the way, Miner laid down a challenge. He decided to develop a piece of soggy ground on the southwest edge of Wisner by filling in the site with tire bales. He'd undertaken a similar project in Wisner, with a state permit. This time, he moved forward without state permission.

Miner contended that baling transformed the scrap tires into a new product. As such, the state's scrap tire rules no longer applied.

His challenge failed when the Nebraska Supreme Court ruled last fall the state had the authority to regulate baled tires.

Miner's case has drawn support from other recyclers.

Cynthia Walton, chief financial officer of Nebraska Rubber Innovations, said "it's a crying shame" that Miner and the state couldn't resolve their differences.

Walton faults both Miner and the state for what happened, but remained most frustrated with the state.

The upshot, she said, was that it's harder for recyclers to succeed. The sale of baled tires provides a market for otherwise unusable tires.

Blumenthal of the Rubber Tire Manufacturers Association said the states that allow tire bales do so on a case-by-case basis. Iowa is among those.

"A fence made out of tire bales," Blumenthal said, "is nothing more than a sophisticated tire dump."

Nebraskans generate the equivalent of 3.5 million passenger tires a year. Most are sent out of state for recycling or burial.

An increasing number are chipped and used as daily cover at Nebraska landfills. Eventually, a substantial portion may end up as fuel for the kilns at Ash Grove Cement Co. in Louisville, Neb.

Larry Bockelman, mayor of Wisner, remembers the excitement at the opening of Miner's business five years ago.

State and local officials celebrated what seemed like guaranteed, steady jobs for the town of 1,200. After all, when would Nebraska run out of tires?

"It was kind of a neat experience," he said. "We thought, 'Here's a great business!'"

Reality has turned out otherwise, and the business became controversial as tires accumulated.

"We tried," Bockelman said. "It didn't work out, for whatever reason. Now it's time to look ahead."  Omaha World Herald