Novelis’ recently released Fiscal Year 2014 sustainability report shows the aluminum rolling and recycling giant making signifi cant investments and strides to advance the circular economy and increase the sustainability of its business, the aluminum industry and its broader value chain.
The company plants to increase its recycling capacity and the recycled content of its products to 80 percent by 2020, which will require less dependence on higher-carbon primary aluminum and more focus on innovation and technology to accelerate the use of recycled aluminum.
Novelis’ innovative business model, which is built on closed-loop recycling, comes at a time when aluminum demand is high and the industries that Novelis serves — automotive, beverage can and specialty markets — are increasingly calling for lighter-weight, low-carbon materials.
“We’re leading the industry to harness the sustainability potential of aluminum as a lightweight, infi nitely recyclable metal,” said Phil Martens, Novelis’ president and CEO. “We’re still early in our journey — and that includes Novelis shifting to more recycled aluminum, which avoids 95 percent of the energy use and greenhouse gas emissions associated with primary production.”
At the end of Fiscal Year 2014, Novelis achieved 46 percent recycled content of its aluminum inputs, up 16 percentage points from the baseline years of 2007- 2009, and is on track to hit 50 percent by the end of the year.
A key component of Novelis’ transformation is a dramatic expansion of its ability to serve the automotive industry – the fastest-growing market for its products – as automakers increasingly turn to lightweight vehicles that are more fuel-effi cient and create fewer emissions.
