4 Great Uses for Recycled Aluminum Scrap Metal

The groundswell of enthusiasm for all things renewable is global. Sustainable practices in manufacturing are gaining popularity as more people hearken to the call of recycling more and disposing of seemingly useless materials less. This gives rise to the ingenuity of industry and other areas of creativity to make the most of existing materials, such as aluminum. To help illustrate this concept, here are four great uses for recycled aluminum scrap metal:

Industrial Applications

Scrap iron is nothing new to industrial metal manufacturing and machinery manufacturing. The emphasis these days is on using recycled aluminum scrap metal as much as possible, which calls for the effort on the parts of those who have aluminum to return for reuse to step up their game. It is lucrative to turn in your aluminum scrap to metal fabricators, and the prices for this material continue to rise whilst utilizing scrap aluminum is much cheaper for the manufacturer.

This scrap metal is used extensively to make containers. It is also widely used throughout the transportation industry in the manufacture of boats, ships, trains, aircraft and automobiles. It is even used in the construction of the roads and bridges that carry those automobiles.

High-Quality Tools

Recycled aluminum scrap metals save not only in preserving raw material consumption, but they use less energy thus produce less Co2 emissions in the refinery process. Steel metal scraps are recycled and made into high-quality tools through an electric arc furnace process, which is also the same process used to produce stainless steel. Copper is another scrap metal that is used to make products following the same steel processes as well as blast and reverberator furnace processes.

Since both industrial and commercial construction and demolition jobs call for waste removal on a constant basis, metal merchants work to establish a set schedule to effectively remove waste metal from job sites whilst ensuring top dollar is paid for post-production scrap.

Household Goods

Aluminum cans are a bulk volume of scrap aluminum that gets recycled, and most often, they are made into cans again. This is due to the fact that aluminum can be recycled repetitively without degrading its fundamental properties.

Aluminum also makes a useful material for many household goods including rain gutters, window frames, doors and siding. Recycled aluminum also makes beautiful and durable home furnishings such as benches, tables, gliders, lamps and cookware, just to name a few useful home goods items. Recycling aluminum saves about 95 percent of the energy it takes for original production from virgin materials.

Other Practical Uses

There is always purpose for the avant-garde artist to seek unorthodox or experimental methods with which to create new works of art. Aluminum cans have proved to be useful in exploring the reaches of creative ingenuity in artistic self-expression whether that is in making visual pieces or producing useful works that can actually be used such as surfboards, boats, bicycles and even complete houses.

Apple computers makes their cases from 100 percent recycled aluminum. Other uses can be in jewelry, handbags, shoes and stamped or tooled boxes. What other ways can you think of that might make useful items from recycled aluminum?

Recycling aluminum scrap metal just makes good sense, both for the economy and for the environment. When production can come full circle and metal fabricators make use of one thing that has lost its usefulness into something else that provides renewed purpose, everyone benefits. Recycling is an underutilized effort that helps bring communities together in an effort to preserve and protect our precious environment.