The Caribbean Cement Co. has removed and incinerated around 6,000 used tires from the Riverton City landfill, located on the outskirts of Kingston, Jamaica, over an 11-day period, reported The Gleaner.
The announcement was made last month by Jamaica Prime Minister Andrew Holness while giving an update on a memorandum of understanding between the government and Caribbean Cement. The pact, which was signed in July 2019, will see the removal of 2 million tires from the Riverton City landfill.
Riverton City is considered one of the government’s greatest challenges, with the dump’s tires forming a large part of the combustible materials in the area. “The best solution to them, which is now being practiced worldwide, is to have them incinerated in a managed process,” Holness said.
Darron Pinnock, production coordinator for the tire-disposal project at Caribbean Cement, said that the tires are transported from Riverton to Caribbean Cement’s Rockfort plant in east Kingston. “Once at the kiln, the temperature is set to 1,400 degrees Celsius and the tires are burnt to ash. This step prevents any gases from being released into the environment,” Pinnock explained.
Pinnock said the company has the ability to burn 800,000 tires in a year and will be able to rid the landfill of tires in five years.
Caribbean Cement is responsible for the costs relating to the offloading of the tires, and both the Ministry of Local Government and the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation share equally in the cost of transporting the tires to the Rockfort plant.
