Aluminium Can Recycling

Did you know?

• 1323 tonnes of aluminium was collected for recycling in the ACT in 2005-06 (this included cans and many other products made of aluminium) 
• In Australia in 2003, approximately 63% of aluminium drink cans were recycled
• Recycling a can 19 times still uses less energy than is needed to make one new can

Introduction

Aluminium today is a familiar and common metal, yet unlike other familiar metals such as iron, bronze and copper, it has only been possible to make aluminium since the early to middle part of the 19th Century. Aluminium has only been used for drink cans in Australia for about 20 years. Australia has large reserves of bauxite, the ore from which aluminium is made, and is one of the world's leading producers of aluminium. According to the Australian Science Magazine, Australia, "mined 38.5 million tonnes of bauxite" and "produced 1.2 million tonnes of aluminium" (8% of world production). 40,000 tonnes of aluminium is used to make aluminium cans in Australia each year - about 2.6 billion cans. (Kaal Australia, 1998).

Manufacture

Bauxite is mined in Australia from open cut mines in Queensland and Western Australia by Alcoa of Australia, and transported to Alcoa's refineries in Queensland and Western Australia, where it is converted into alumina, a fine white powder. The alumina is transported to a smelting plant in Geelong (Victoria) where pure aluminium is extracted. The pure aluminium is cast into large aluminium ingots by Kaal Australia in its Geelong plant. Kaal Australia rolls the ingots into long sheets of aluminium for Southvorp and Containers Packaging who convert the sheets into aluminium cans - body, top and tab.

Recycling

Aluminium cans that have been collected for recycling are first sorted and then baled into bricks. The bricks are transported to processing plants where they are fed into rotary furnaces and the aluminium heated to about 7000 degrees Celsius. The molten aluminium is then cast into ingots that are sent to rolling mills where they are remade into new cans. In some cases, the recycled cans are reprocessed into other aluminium products.

Sources

Alcoa and Comalco brochures

Industry Commission, 1991, Recycling, Vol. 1, Recycling in Australia, Report No. 6.

Beverage Industry Environment Council, 1996, Recycling Audit and Garbage Bin Analysis, June - September.

Recycling and Resource Recovery Council, 1994, Recycling and Resource Recovery in Victoria, Annual Report.