According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, in 2008, there were 3.4 million tons of aluminum in the municipal solid waste stream. Used beverage containers, such as soda and beer cans, were the largest source of aluminum waste. Although there are numerous benefits to recycling aluminum, including energy savings and pollution reduction, less than half of the cans made in 2008 were recycled. There is no federal law that requires you to recycle your aluminum cans; however, many states have passed recycling-related legislation.
Recycling is popular in our environmentally conscious world, and aluminum cans are among the most valuable and readily recycled products. How then, do we explain a 2008 Environmental Protection Agency report that only 48% of ca...
Metal cans were originally developed to store food for soldiers to carry into the field. In 1795, the French government offered a prize of 12,000 francs to anyone who could invent an effective means of preserving food, accordin...
Yet scrap metals like aluminum are among the most commonly recycled materials in the U.S. Although there are numerous environmental benefits to recycling aluminum cans, the process of recycling aluminum cans is not without its ...
A quick Internet search brings up numerous sites and articles about recycling the tabs on aluminum cans. Depending on what you read or who you believe, the tabs are more beneficial to recycle than the can. In a nutshell, they'r...
Aluminum production, as with any manufacturing process, uses energy. This energy, in turn, impacts the environment. When you recycle aluminum, you reduce the amount of trash which ends up in landfills. Your actions also benefit...
Recycling aluminum is made easy by curbside pickup programs and increasingly commonplace recycling containers in public places, such as schools and parks. With the help of consumers, recycling can be even more commonplace. Acco...
Aluminum is produced out of an ore called bauxite. Bauxite ore is not scarce, but recycling makes much more sense from an energy perspective than doing the resource extraction and transportation involved in building a whole new...
Aluminum cans are one of the most commonly recycled products. There are many economic and ecological benefits associated with the recycling of aluminum, and the recycled material can be used in the production of a variety of ne...
Aluminum is the most valuable of all recyclable materials, according to The Aluminum Association, with a value four times greater than other recycled consumer materials. Most recycled aluminum goes into the production of new be...
To understand what those benefits are and why can recycling is so important, you need to know how recycling works and what happens to your soda can after you drop it in the bin.
Styrofoam is a major environmental problem. Used in product packages and the shipping industry, the world produces tons of it each year. The fact that Styrofoam is non-biodegradable adds to the ecological impact. Landfills are ...
Manufacturing 60,000 aluminum cans requires one ton of aluminum, according to Alcoa. Bauxite ore is a key mineral used to make aluminum. Bauxite was discovered in mines in the U.S. at the turn of the 19th century; today, mining...
Aluminum cans are among the most recycled materials in the world. Every minute, the United States alone recycles approximately 120,000 cans. This sheer amount of conservation has many benefits for the economy and the environmen...
Several factors weigh in favor of recycling aluminum. It doesn't deteriorate and can be recycled indefinitely with no loss in quality. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, recycling aluminum takes 95 percent...
The EPA estimates that just under one million tons of aluminum beverage cans were collected for recycling in 2008. Aluminum can recycling conserves energy and natural resources while also reducing landfill waste. The process fo...
Use recycled aluminum such as soda cans to create several crafts to add to the decor of your home or garden. Most of the materials for these projects may already be available in your home, saving you some cash and a trip to you...
Recycling aluminum saves space in landfills and conserves energy. The Clean Air Council estimates that "throwing away one aluminum can wastes as much energy as if that can were 1/2 full of gasoline." When thinking of recycling ...
Americans use a huge number of aluminum cans. Luckily, they also recycle a huge number of them. More than 100,000 cans are recycled each minute, according to Earth 911. Recycling and reusing aluminum is common because it is sup...
Aluminum is one of the most widely recycled materials in the world, according to San Jose State University. By recycling aluminum cans and other products, you can reduce your impact on the environment and help reduce pollution....
The different phases associated with the transformation of recovered materials into new materials can make the process seem complicated. Aluminum is a material that is commonly recycled, and the process, which typically takes a...
Recycling bins have become a well-established part of life, but recycling aluminum actually did not start until the 1960s. The Clean Air Council says over 65 billion cans are used per year. Recycling those cuts down on the ener...
Given the prevalence of curbside pickup and recycling dropoff centers, recycling the aluminum can that contains your soda or the aluminum foil that wraps your brownies often takes only a little effort, but the payoff is big. Be...
Aluminum is the material of choice for 99 percent of all beer cans and 97 percent of all soft drink cans, based on U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) figures. With the amount being generated, you may wonder how much is ...
Recycling programs feature an array of products that can be collected curbside or at collection centers. Few people know that aluminum foil, also known as tin foil, is recyclable. Americans throw out some three pounds of tin fo...
Aluminum is endlessly recyclable, which provides an infinite opportunity to reduce its presence in landfills. Because the process of recycling aluminum involves high temperatures, inadequately cleaned cans can still be recycled...
The average aluminum can in America has 40 percent post-consumer recycled aluminum, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
When you throw away aluminum products, such as beverage cans and food containers,...
According to the sustainable living website Earth911.com, two-thirds of all aluminum ever produced is still in use today. Aluminum cans can be recycled again and again, creating a new product for 1/20th of the energy of newly-...
Perhaps the best quality they have is that they are incredibly recyclable. In fact, a can may be recycled an infinite amount of times and become not only a new can, but also a number of other different products. Recycling not o...
Worse, you might just toss it into the trash instead of the recycling and think that one can won't make that much difference. Yet, the can you tossed away already contains 40 percent postconsumer recycled aluminum, notes the U....
Recycling aluminum provides tremendous benefits. Recycling aluminum uses far less energy than refining new aluminum. It also keeps large amounts of trash out of landfills and puts money into consumers' pockets, from aluminum ca...
In other words, recycled aluminum is just as strong as virgin aluminum. Yet when it comes to recycling, most people overlook aluminum foil and toss it in the garbage. Recycling aluminum foil protects the environment, preserves ...
Unlike such materials as paper, aluminum can be recycled a limitless number of times, making it one of the most valuable materials collected for recycling. The Aluminum Association reports, however, that Americans sti
Aluminum cans are one of the few packaging items that are 100 percent recyclable. Despite the ease of recycling in most areas, the aluminum can recycling rate is only at around 52 percent, according to the Can Manufacturers Ins...
Because it is used so frequently, it is important to know how to ensure it will always be available. Luckily, aluminum recycling occurs across the globe to sustain the production of these products.
Aluminum beverage cans are the most commonly recycled item in the United States, according to the City of Fort Myers website. Like many metals, aluminum can be recycled indefinitely while still maintaining the same basic proper...
Aluminum can drives are common personal and organization fund raising efforts for good reason--aluminum cans are readily available, accepted by many recycling outlets and don't require much in the way of special preparation bef...
Aluminum scrap consists of aluminum and other metals that determine each product's texture, hardness and strength. Listed as the second-most-recycled metal in the world by Action Recycling Center of Wheatridge, Colo., aluminum ...
There are both environmental and economic benefits of recycling aluminum. Metals like aluminum can be recycled again and used to make products such as beverage cans, auto parts and appliances. Even though more aluminum is recyc...
Each batch of recycled aluminum has the same integrity as newly refined aluminum. Extracting aluminum from the environment and refining it takes a great deal of energy, most of which can be saved by recycling already-refined al...
Aluminum recycling is both a great success story about environmental responsibility and an alarming failure. The aluminum industry and its sister aluminum recycling industry have embraced recycling as an economically favorable ...
The Environmental Protection Agency reports that the United States generates close to 2 million tons of aluminum from packaging such as soda cans each year. Recycling can give new life to used aluminum cans--but the fact is, ma...
Before "going green" was big news, kids were returning aluminum cans for pennies, and the words "recycling" and "cans" go hand in hand. According to the Aluminum Association, in 1972, 24,000 metric tons of used beverage cans we...
Recycling aluminum is not only good for the environment, it also saves billions of dollars each year. According to the Aluminum Association, the aluminum can is so easily recyclable, more than half of all cans are recycled, wit...
Aluminum is the most widely used and valuable metal on earth, according to the U.S. Geological Survey, and recycling it represents a crucial process in the aluminum industry. Several personal and wide-scale environmental benefi...
If you're not recycling aluminum, you're missing one of the easiest and most effective ways to protect the environment and reduce your carbon footprint. Aluminum producer Alcoa estimates that Americans recycle more than a billi...
Aluminum is well-known for its ability to be easily recycled, and the Waste Care Corporation estimates that 100,000 aluminum cans are recycled in the United States every minute. But for all the benefits recycling aluminum has, ...
