Aluminum recycling facts? How Failing to Recycle Aluminum Harms the Environment: Globally, the aluminum industry annually emits millions of tons of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, which contributes to global warming. Although aluminum cans represent only 1.4% of a ton of garbage by weight, according to the Container Recycling Institute, they account for 14.1% of the greenhouse gas impacts associated with replacing an average ton of garbage with new products made from virgin materials.

The main challenge to recycling aluminum foil is that it is often contaminated with food waste. Grease and oils can damage recycling equipment and create an inferior end product, so food-affected waste has to be thrown away (all that food will also cause the foil to smell really bad, which will make the staff at your local recycling center very unhappy). Some communities accept aluminum foil in their recycling bins as long as it is clean. Others are not willing to take that risk. We have some advice for dedicated recyclers who really want to keep their aluminum foil out of landfills. We also share a couple of ways to decrease your use of aluminum foil.

What about aluminum pie plates and trays? If your local recycling program accepts aluminum foil, it will most often accept other aluminum food storage products. You’ll want to make sure these items are rinsed first, though. How is aluminum foil recycled? First, aluminum of all types must be separated from steel using an eddy current in a materials recovery facility. The aluminum is crushed and baled, then sent to a metal recycler. At this point, the aluminum is cleaned and melted into sheets of aluminum, where it can be manufactured into aluminum cans or foil products. Find extra info on can i recycle aluminum foil.

Before you put your foil in the recycling bin, make sure your local recycling program accepts it; not all of them do. Incidentally, usually if foil is accepted, disposable aluminum baking pans also will be. Just be sure to only recycle aluminum foil that is clean, even if it means rinsing it off first. (And as long as you’re cleaning it, you might as well reuse it a couple of times first!)

Aluminum Recycling Saves Energy! Discarded aluminum beverage cans are often recycled right back into new cans. Used beverage containers are the largest component of aluminum scrap. Most of these are recycled back into cans. The automotive industry is the second-largest user of recovered aluminum. According to Steve Larkin, president of the Aluminum Association, recycling old cans into new ones uses 95 percent less energy and produces 95 percent fewer greenhouse gas emissions than producing new cans entirely from scratch. In fact, the recovered aluminum processed in a typical year saves the energy equivalent of 1.3 billion gallons of gasoline. Read even more information at https://www.ablison.com/how-to-recycle-aluminum-foil-and-is-it-biodegradable/.