Ontario dealing with growing stockpiles of old tires

An Ontario tire recycling rule change cut annual targets, creating a backlog and stockpiles like the site in Azilda, currently exceeding its licence limit.

Amendments made last year to Ontario’s used tire collection program are leading to a huge stockpile of tires at some yards in the province, experts say, including one in the Greater Sudbury community of Azilda.

The changes took effect in January 2025. Before then, 85 per cent of tires were collected by weight and the amount had to be recycled each calendar year.

Since the amendment took effect, only 65 per cent of all tires by weight and 60 per cent of large tires have to be recycled each year until 2029 by the tire producers.

Adam Moffett of the Ontario Tire Dealers’ Association said it’s a little confusing, but basically the changes mean that recycling requirements are now far below the number of tires generated in Ontario each year, leading to growing stockpiles.

“It’s a little bit difficult to compare the two apples to apples, because you go from two targets to one,” said Adam Moffett of the Ontario Tire Dealers’ Association.

“But most certainly the 65 per cent target that was introduced was lower than the tire generation in the Province of Ontario, which has led to some of the large-scale backlogs and surpluses that we have in the province right now.”

One of those stockpiles is located in Sudbury, said a spokesperson for the Ministry of the Environment, Conservation and Parks.

“As of Jan. 8, the ministry determined that the William Day Construction in Azilda was storing more tires than permitted under its Environmental Compliance Approval,” a statement from the ministry said.

“The company has begun removing tires and volumes are expected to continue declining in the coming weeks.”

William Day Construction Ltd. didn’t respond to requests from CTV News Northern Ontario to comment on the situation.

Moffett said the used tire stockpiles aren’t a problem that will go away anytime soon.

Growing challenge

“The challenge there becomes, how do you mitigate this going forward, especially with the spring tire season coming, our second busiest time of the year,” he said.

“Based on the amount of tires that are in the province, we will not be able to get the province cleaned up before the spring rush hits, which will put us even further back again.”

Producers that manufacture tires enlist the help of pros with the collection of used tires to meet the recycling requirements. But they haven’t been able to keep up with demand.

“The general consensus was on Jan. 1 that … all the processing plants would be operational, the pros would be full tilt,” Moffett said.

“But we aren’t seeing that kind of activity at this point in time. So one of the growing concerns that we have with that is if it remains stagnant as it is right now, I’m not sure that enough tires are being collected today to even keep up with the generation of new tires, let alone the inventory and the large stockpiles that are carrying forward from last year.”

When they buy new tires, consumers pay a surcharge to fund the recycling of old tires. However, once the 65 per cent recycling quota is met, additional tires are not legally required to be recycled, creating an excess number of tires across the province.