Thursday 4 January 2007

Focus on Aluminium





Aluminium is a valuable material. As most people are aware the most noted source of aluminium in the market place is with drink cans, all of which can go into the green bin.
In Ireland, we are recycling approximately 40% of cans but we can also recycle Aluminium Foils such as Take away trays, Aluminium foil and trays from items like mini tarts and cakes. Just rinse clean and scrunch together. Cans take up a lot of space if they are not compressed so make sure you squash them.

All aluminium products can be recycled after use. Scrap is generally taken by road to the recycling plant where it is checked and sorted to determine composition and value. If the scrap is of unknown quality the aluminium will first be passed through some large magnets to remove any ferrous metal. Depending upon the type of contamination present, some scrap must be processed further, beverage cans for example must have their lacquer removed prior to re-melting.
The scrap aluminium is then loaded into a furnace, which melts the aluminium completely. This molten metal is then cast or processed. Anything made of aluminium can be recycled repeatedly.

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