Reducing of Energy Consumption by Improving the Reclaiming Technology in Autoclave of a Rubber Wastes

Abstract

The devulcanization of the rubber wastes in autoclave represent a technological variant that allows the superior utilization of rubber wastes, but with high energy consumption. The researches aimed at improving the devulcanization technology in order to obtain reclaimed rubber with superior characteristics, but also with a reduction in energy consumption. An improvement to devulcanization technology consisted in vacuuming the autoclave at the end of the devulcanization process. An increase in the degree of devulcanization of the rubber from 86.83% to 93.81% and an improvement of the physico-mechanical characteristics of the reclaimed rubber was achieved by applying this technology. The realization of the new type of regenerated rubber allowed for an increase in the degree of it use for different mixtures, from 15–20 phr to 30–40 phr without substantially affecting the physical and mechanical properties of the products. Additionally, the researche has shown that, by obtaining the new type of reclaimed rubber, the duration of the refining process has been reduced by 30%. All of this leads to a considerable reduction in energy consumption and transformation of the rubber waste reclaiming process into a sustainable one.