Originally Posted by podman
let's see.. your riding produced four flats that became four patches in seven years...
so if your repairs were altered you would have four tubes in seven years.. how does this equal the disposal of a car tire?
i rarely get flats when using quality kevlar tires, maybe every couple months... when i use cheap tires i get them weekly, so if we are to compare the environmental impacts of one that patches with cheap tires then i would speculate the impact could be much more compared to one that replaces a tube with each puncture given the rubber cement manufaturing and foil tube waste etc. that is entailed in the patching.
but really isn't this a hypercritical point?
i certainly don't think anyone is "crazy" for patching or replacing.. but then i replace so maybe i am indeed "crazy"
When you live in the land of poky things like I do, replacement can become expensive indeed. Four flats is common for a per week average especially when the goatheads cure out in the fall. To each his own.
From an environmental stand point however, the amount of volatile organic compounds released by patching a tube rather than replacing it and the waste involved is far outweighed by volative organic compounds and waste involved in producing the tube even with multiple patches. A new tube requires lots more chemicals and energy to produce also as well as the solid waste from the packaging and the old tube. From that standpoint, it "better" to patch than replace...even with good tires.