While the process of extracting aluminum from ore consumes a large amount of electricity, two-thirds of this processing now uses electricity generated without CO₂ emissions - hydroelectric power.

Newly developed processes for re-cycling have reduced energy consumption by 80-90% in comparison to aluminum production from ore. Reprocessing now produces high quality aluminum without loss of properties and there is no requirement to mix the recycled product with ‘pure’ aluminum from ore.

Re-cycled aluminum can also be alloyed with other elements to achieve specific performance characteristics. Thus, with an ever-increasing proportion of re-cycled metal in use, aluminum can be accurately described as the ultimate ‘sustainable’ material.

In practice, most of the recycled aluminum is captured by the automotive industry and is used for vehicle components.