Alcoa makes recycling commitment
Aluminium producer Alcoa is supporting a campaign designed to help increase US recycling rates.
At the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) annual meeting, Alcoa, Alcoa Foundation and Keep America Beautiful (KAB), announced a national commitment to increase recycling rates through a campaign called Action to Accelerate Recycling.
The aim of the campaign is to generate awareness, create incentives, and provide recycling access and infrastructure to increase US recycling of aluminium, plastic, glass and paper. The commitment, which includes $2 million in funding from Alcoa and Alcoa Foundation, is expected to engage millions of Americans and increase the current US recycling rate by 10 percentage points. Increasing the rate to 75% would generate close to 300 additional tons of recycled content, resulting in the avoidance of more than 2,850 tons of greenhouse gas emissions.
The US recycling rate lags behind the rest of the world, which has financial and environmental implications: millions of dollars spent on landfills and transporting waste; billions of dollars lost from residual value of scrap; and missed opportunities to create green jobs.
“For every can that is recycled, we save energy and money, reduce our environmental impact, and create economic opportunities in US communities,” says Klaus Kleinfeld, chairman and CEO of Alcoa. “Our partnership with Keep America Beautiful is a ‘call to action’ for companies, consumers and community organisations to make recycling a priority. Together with our industry partners, we set and can achieve an ambitious yet achievable 75% aluminium can recycling rate by 2015 in the US.”
