Climate Break-Even Conditions for End-of-Life Tennis Ball Recovery: Core Formulation, Functional Substitution and Collection Logistics

End-of-liferecovery ofcompositeproducts can reduce climate impacts when avoided production exceeds collection and processing emissions.We quantifythisbalanceforused tennisballsusing published core formulations, a field tyre-granulation inventory and natural-rubber production intensities. For 1,000 balls (57.6 kg), a nominal core fraction of 0.80 and retention of 0.80 give 36.86 kg of recovered core compound. The required avoided-production intensity is 0.166 kg CO2e per kilogram of recovered core compound with a mass-allocated shared 100-km trip and 0.790 kg CO2e/kg with a dedicated trip. A comparison with recycledtyre crumb yields a processing-only break-even condition determined by material yields: cy ≥ 0.80, when both routes share the same per-input processing inventory and the materials provide equivalent function at a 1:1 mass ratio. Because the largest examined value of cy is 0.779 (core fractions 0.78–0.82; retentions 0.50–0.95), no examined combination of core fraction and retention reaches break-even against recycled-tyre crumb, even without transport. Natural-rubber substitution yields distinct thresholds depending on formulation and sourceregion land-use history. Industrial composting experiments provide an additional example of functional reuse through measured ventilation-energy savings.