Achieving Carbon Neutrality in the Global Aluminum Industry

In the 21st century, sustainability is widely regarded as the new corporate culture, and leading manufacturing companies (Toyota, GE, and Alcoa) and service companies (Google and Federal Express) are striving towards carbon neutrality. The current carbon footprint of the global aluminum industry is estimated at 500 million metric tonnes carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2eq), representing about 1.7% of global emissions from all sources. For the global aluminum industry, carbon neutrality is defined as a state where the total “in-use” CO2eq saved from all products in current use, including incremental process efficiency improvements, recycling, and urban mining activities, equals the CO2eq expended to produce the global output of aluminum. This paper outlines an integrated and quantifiable plan for achieving “carbon neutrality” in the global aluminum industry by advocating five actionable steps: (1) increase use of “green” electrical energy grid by 8%, (2) reduce process energy needs by 16%, (3) deploy 35% of products in “in-use” energy saving applications, (4) divert 6.1 million metric tonnes/year from landfills, and (5) mine 4.5 million metric tonnes/year from aluminum-rich “urban mines.” Since it takes 20 times more energy to make aluminum from bauxite ore than to recycle it from scrap, the global aluminum industry could set a reasonable, self-imposed energy/carbon neutrality goal to incrementally increase the supply of recycled aluminum by at least 1.05 metric tonnes for every tonne of incremental production via primary aluminum smelter capacity. Furthermore, the aluminum industry can and should take a global leadership position by actively developing internationally accepted and approved carbon footprint credit protocols.