Top 8 campaigns promoting the power of aluminium recycling

Campaigns, promotions and other programmes educate people about the most important yet easily missed activities in life. One of them is aluminium recycling! Aluminium, one of the widely used metals in various sectors due to its infinitely recyclable properties without losing its original qualities, has made it one of the most in-demand metals. As per AL Circle's recently published report, "Global Aluminium Industry: Key Trends to 2030," global recycled aluminium utilisation was 27.1 million tonnes in 2022 and is likely to exceed 28 million tonnes in 2023. The worldwide demand for recycled aluminium is primarily driven by end-user industries such as packaging, automotive, construction, and electronics.

Aluminium is reaching almost all spaces. In this journey, campaigns or activities like EEG's Can Collection Campaign and Alupro's #FoilFriday campaign are a few initiatives to promote or highlight the importance of aluminium recycling. Below is a list of top initiatives promoting aluminium recycling:

Can Collection Day by EEG

The Can Collection Campaign, started by EEG in 1997, was the first environmental community action project created to back the Leadership's goal of making the economy more sustainable. Since inception until the end of 2022, EEG has collected 378,083 kg of used aluminium cans, which led to the mitigation of 5,675 MT CO2e, saved 86,046 Million BTU of energy and 9,178 m3 of landfill space. As of February 26, 2023, Emirates Environmental Group (EEG) gathered 7,357 kg of aluminium cans in its first extensive recycling campaign for 2023. The subject of the campaign was "Say: Yes to Can Recycling, No to Carbon Emissions." Mrs Habiba Al Mar'ashi, Chairperson of Emirates Environmental Group, said the topic was selected to prove that even modest sustainability efforts, such as sorting recyclables, may significantly cut atmospheric carbon emissions. She believes that implementing community-wide, action-oriented projects is the greatest method to rescue the earth.

Secrets of Aluminium by Alupro

Alupro recently launched an instructional movie, 'Secrets of Aluminium,' educating the viewers behind the scenes of the post-consumer journey, from recycling bin to reprocessing, as part of its continued efforts to promote awareness about the benefits of recycling aluminium packaging. 'Secrets of Aluminium,' narrated by irreverent sports commentator Nick Heath, provides an amusing look into the circular process while refuting many prevalent beliefs and spotlighting the UK's thriving aluminium supply chain.

Tom Giddings, executive director of Alupro, said, "The aluminium packaging recycling process may be common knowledge for the supply chain, but consumers are still widely unaware of what happens to their waste once it leaves the kerbside. As a result, there's a fair amount of misinformation and scepticism about how much packaging collected in the UK is recycled. Secrets of Aluminium aims to dispel the myths and highlight the infinite circularity of metal packaging."

'Infinity Room' by ECC

In celebration of Recycle Week's 20th anniversary, an immersive display centred on recycling was launched at W5 Belfast, a renowned Science & Discovery Centre. The exhibit known as the 'Infinity Room', developed by the non-profit organisation Every Can Counts (ECC), received several accolades for its innovative approach to educating individuals of all age groups about the significance of recycling aluminium cans and visually demonstrating the perpetual recyclability of aluminium.

The display consisted of 1,500 recycled aluminium cans and 25 square metres of mirrors. The display also offered a captivating visual experience, allowing visitors to capture and share their photographs and films of the Infinity Room on various social media platforms with the hashtag #EveryCanCounts.

#FoilFriday by Alupro

As part of its continuous efforts to increase aluminium recycling rates in the UK, Alupro launched a new consumer engagement campaign called #FoilFriday. Between July and December, households will be targeted with various digital media assets to improve aluminium foil recycling and reduce contamination. In partnership with local governments, the campaign will use social media to encourage residents to recycle more at home. The Alupro website provides a free download of a suite of #FoilFriday social media assets promoting recycling best practices and linking to important issues throughout the year. The six-month campaign includes website content, a foil information sheet, and local press releases, with all promotional materials available in Welsh.

CAN to CAN

The Japanese aluminium company UACJ and the Toyo Seikan Group Holdings had signed a partnership agreement to advance the horizontal recycling of aluminium cans via joint research. Together, the two companies aim to leverage their combined resources to bring environmentally friendlier aluminium cans to market. Additionally, both organisations will consider collaborating on measures to increase "CAN to CAN" horizontal aluminium can recycling, which involves encouraging the collection and recycling of old aluminium cans throughout the whole value chain. Aluminium beverage cans in Japan have a very high recycling rate of 97 per cent. However, the latest evaluation showed that less than 60 per cent of the can's body and lid are constructed entirely of recycled aluminium. Since only around 3 per cent of the CO2 is released during the production of recycled aluminium ingots compared to brand-new ingots, a higher recycling rate would considerably reduce emissions.

Malta’s BCRS

More than 20 million aluminium cans and bottles have been handed in since the commencement of the Beverage Container Refund Scheme (BCRS) in Malta, allowing the company in charge of the initiative to fulfil the target it set for the first two years of operations, as stated by BCRS Malta Ltd chairman Pierre Fava. Around 600 metric tonnes of containers have been sent to Bales for recycling. Fava says the company was "extremely encouraged" by the public's reaction, which allowed it to recover 70 per cent of all containers sold within its first two years.

#PurinaRecyclesChallenge

In its latest #PurinaRecyclesChallenge initiative, pet food manufacturer Purina urged pet owners to recycle their used aluminium and steel cans, promoting sustainability and highlighting the importance of recycling. Although aluminium and steel pet food cans are naturally recyclable, this effort attempts to increase the rate at which they are recycled. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) reports that just 32 per cent of waste gets recycled.

While consumers may help ensure that pet food cans are adequately disposed of in recycling bins, their involvement is still required. The use of recycled aluminium in producing new aluminium cans results in a 95 per cent reduction in the energy needed to manufacture cans from primary materials, highlighting the importance of recycling pet food cans.

#CircleCity

Belfast #CircleCity, a new on-the-go recycling scheme in Belfast City Centre made possible by The Coca-Cola Foundation, is another campaign promoting the importance of aluminium recycling amongst the audience. Launched together by Coca-Cola, Belfast City Council, and the environmental charity Hubbub, the three-month project focussed on making recycling aluminium cans and plastic bottles as easy as possible for residents and visitors, resulting in higher recycling rates. Belfast #CircleCity follows the success of similar pilot programmes in Dublin, Leeds, and the London district of Lambeth since 2018. Over 2.5 million aluminium cans, plastic and glass bottles were collected and recycled in prior pilot operations. The previous effort in Lambeth witnessed a 70 per cent drop in contamination (i.e. non-recyclable waste in recycling bins) while boosting recycling by 140 per cent, and the upcoming initiative in Belfast seeks to increase recycling while simultaneously reducing contamination.