Parent company Bridgestone Americas says that major strides have been made during the off-season to incorporate more sustainable and bio-circular materials into its IndyCar products, which it believes will make the upcoming season the most sustainable to date.
The alternate, softer compound Firestone Firehawks used in last year’s Music City Grand Prix on Nashville's streets will become the norm for all five temporary tracks on the 2023 IndyCar schedule.
This entails Firestone producing over 1900 tires using a sidewall material made exclusively with rubber derived from the guayule woody desert shrub grown on the company’s farm in Eloy, Arizona.
Bridgestone has already invested more than $100m to commercialise guayule and has received multiple U.S. government grants for guayule research and development.
In August 2022, Bridgestone announced its plans to invest an additional $42m to establish commercial operations, with additional investment and expansion toward 2030. This investment should increase capacity of up to 25,000 additional acres of farmland for planting and harvesting guayule in collaboration with local U.S. farmers and Native American tribes.
Bridgestone is targeting commercial production of guayule-derived natural rubber by the end of the decade, and aims for carbon neutrality with tyres made entirely from sustainable materials by 2050.
The majority of race tyres used this season will be manufactured at Firestone’s new energy-efficient Advanced Test Production Center in Akron, Ohio, which has received International Sustainability and Carbon Certification (ISCC) plus recognition for its transparency and traceability of sustainable raw materials.
The company will also utilise “ISCC mass balance certified synthetic rubber made with recycled plastics” in all tyres used in the Indianapolis 500.
Bridgestone Americas CEO Paolo Ferrari said: “We are driving sustainability in every area of our business, and we’re thrilled to be advancing guayule and other sustainable practices in America’s premier open-wheel racing series.
“Firestone has a tremendous legacy of innovation and performance in racing, which we will continue to build upon as we move into this new era of cleaner, safer and more sustainable mobility on and off the track.”
