The annual meeting of Bipaver, the European tire retreaders' association, was held digitally at the end of June, and saw, as always after two years, the renewal of its corporate bodies. Opening the proceedings, the outgoing president, Finland's Jukka Lankolainen, emphasized in his speech the complexity of the moment the industry is facing as a result of the pandemic and the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. "The conflict shows how fragile global production and supply structures are," he said. "Not only the direct effects on prices and availability for commodities such as carbon black, synthetic rubber, oil and gas, but also the dramatic increase in costs and transport capacities to and from Asia have a huge impact on the tire and retreading industry. We have seen frequent price hikes, drops in production, and availability issues throughout the year, and there will most likely be no positive changes in the immediate future." However, the association's commitment to the many activities affecting the retreading industry on technical and regulatory issues has not diminished; in fact, members were shown the main updates coming from the various working groups, especially at the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, where Bipaver is working on a proposal to revise the ECE UN 109 (retreaded truck and bus tires) approval regulation in order to introduce new test approval methods for 3PMSF-marked retreads, which would be the same as those provided for new tires, so as to open up the OEM market for retreads as well; incoming novelties will also affect ECE Regulation UN 117 (Uniform Provisions concerning the Approval of Tires with regard to Rolling Sound Emissions, Wet Grip and/or Rolling Resistance), to which the new wet grip parameter for worn tires should be added, responding to the European Commission's goal of extending product life. A further amendment to Regulation 117 itself (if not the issuing of a tailor-make regulation) will also address the issue of measuring tire abrasion in order to limit the emission of microplastics into the environment. On the other hand, no progress has been made on labels for retreaded tires: news from the European Commission is still expected on this issue after the preliminary exchanges of information last year. At the conclusion of the assembly's work, the association's bodies were renewed for the next two years, with the appointment of Guido Gambassi, former deputy secretary of AIRP and Federpneus, and already Bipaver vice-president during the last term of office, as president; the new vice-president is instead Carlo Hijzen, president of the Dutch association VACO. "This is an important and significant appointment for AIRP, which has always believed in the importance of international collaborations to protect the interests of tire retreaders and for the achievement of common goals," Gambassi said. For this, and more generally to put the retreading industry in a position to be increasingly competitive and perform well in the face of the profound technological developments that are affecting the entire automotive sector AIRP will continue to support Bipaver, working to consolidate and expand the role of retreading as a best practice for a sustainable mobility model and in favour of a circular economy."
