There are different grades btw, recycled aluminum isn’t used for most aviation or military stuff in general due to regulations on purity and such. But I guess that’s a positive for the world regardless.
From looking it up, it seems like making new aluminum from alumina ore is a massively energy intensive process, whereas recycling aluminum is just about melting it so takes a lot less energy.
It seems like, if the demand were there, it would be easy to make ultra pure aluminum from beer cans etc. It’s just that right now there’s enough demand for lower purity aluminum that the recyclers aren’t bothering to chase the market for the ultra-pure stuff.
According to my friend who used to work with that stuff, the bigger “problem” is mostly with regulations and balancing the risks; the damage potential of an aircraft accident (loss of life, brand reputation, recalls, etc) is exponentially more expensive than however much you’d save in production costs. Closed-loop recycling is usually the focus instead. But it would of course be cool.
At least that’s kinda Airbuses viewpoint on it. Boeing on the other hand might be fine with delivering dodgy stuff and bribing away any possible fines ;)
It makes sense if everything that comes out of a ore-to-aluminum system is very pure whereas the stuff that comes out of a recycler isn’t guaranteed to be as pure. You could probably set up some kind of quality control pipeline to ensure that the recycled stuff you were buying was top purity. But, that would add expense. It’s also an untried way of doing things, whereas the ore-to-aluminum pipeline is probably well known and trusted.
There’s probably a price where it makes sense, either ultra-pure recycled aluminum gets cheap enough that it’s worth switching, or the aluminum that comes from ore is too expensive. But, until then the current system works and nobody wants to potentially be blamed for causing a crash by trying to save some money.
Good thing alluminum is recyclible. Just make sure it isn’t being thrown away or only used in exports.
There are different grades btw, recycled aluminum isn’t used for most aviation or military stuff in general due to regulations on purity and such. But I guess that’s a positive for the world regardless.
From looking it up, it seems like making new aluminum from alumina ore is a massively energy intensive process, whereas recycling aluminum is just about melting it so takes a lot less energy.
It seems like, if the demand were there, it would be easy to make ultra pure aluminum from beer cans etc. It’s just that right now there’s enough demand for lower purity aluminum that the recyclers aren’t bothering to chase the market for the ultra-pure stuff.
According to my friend who used to work with that stuff, the bigger “problem” is mostly with regulations and balancing the risks; the damage potential of an aircraft accident (loss of life, brand reputation, recalls, etc) is exponentially more expensive than however much you’d save in production costs. Closed-loop recycling is usually the focus instead. But it would of course be cool.
At least that’s kinda Airbuses viewpoint on it. Boeing on the other hand might be fine with delivering dodgy stuff and bribing away any possible fines ;)
It makes sense if everything that comes out of a ore-to-aluminum system is very pure whereas the stuff that comes out of a recycler isn’t guaranteed to be as pure. You could probably set up some kind of quality control pipeline to ensure that the recycled stuff you were buying was top purity. But, that would add expense. It’s also an untried way of doing things, whereas the ore-to-aluminum pipeline is probably well known and trusted.
There’s probably a price where it makes sense, either ultra-pure recycled aluminum gets cheap enough that it’s worth switching, or the aluminum that comes from ore is too expensive. But, until then the current system works and nobody wants to potentially be blamed for causing a crash by trying to save some money.