New Can Manufacturers Institute Report Shows How the Can Industry will Meet Its Ambitious Recycling Rate Targets

Can Manufacturers Institute (CMI) published today a detailed aluminum beverage can recycling primer and roadmap that explains how the ambitious U.S. aluminum beverage can recycling rate targets that CMI members announced in November 2021 will be achieved. Those targets are reaching a 70 percent recycling rate by 2030, 80 percent by 2040 and 90 percent by 2050. This new report provides more details on what the can industry is doing in the near-term within its four pillars of action to make progress toward the targets and the potential total used beverage cans (UBC) that could be recycled through certain pillars.

The aluminum beverage can is the most recycled beverage container in the United States with a 45 percent recycling rate in 2020. The U.S. aluminum beverage can industry knows improving upon that leading position by achieving the targets will not be easy but will have a significant impact. Consider that in 2020, for the aluminum beverage can recycling rate to have reached 70 percent, 25.6 billion more cans needed to be recycled. If the target had been met and those additional cans recycled, it would have generated more than $400 million in revenue for the U.S. recycling system and resulted in energy savings that could power more than 1 million U.S. homes for an entire year.

The report explains in detail how CMI will achieve its targets via four pillars of action, which are:

  1. Catalyze the passage and implementation of well-designed deposit systems at the state and federal levels.
  2. Increase and improve household and away-from-home recycling.
  3. Ensure that more cans are properly sorted at recycling centers.
  4. Increase consumer understanding on the importance of aluminum can recycling and the ability to collect and sell used beverage cans for cash.

This report provides new data on the potential impact of certain pillars. For example, if there was a national deposit system that had recycling rates similar to a state such as Michigan where there is a 10-cent deposit, an additional 50 billion aluminum beverage cans would be redeemed through the deposit system and ultimately recycled. This pillar has the greatest potential impact and would allow the industry to quickly reach its goals. This is part of why CMI is aggressively pushing for new, well-designed deposit systems.

CMI modeling also finds that 23 billion additional aluminum beverage cans could be captured from U.S. households if they all went from their current level of recycling access to having automatic, cart-based curbside recycling service with robust education. This number was calculated based on data from The Recycling Partnership (The Partnership). CMI was a founding member of what ultimately became The Partnership and is continuing its general support of the organization so it can continue its work to increase and improve household recycling.
more at: https://www.crowncork.com/news/press-room/new-can-manufacturers-institute-report-shows-how-can-industry-will-meet-its

Related Posts

Tronox Receives Platinum Rating from EcoVadis for Sustainability Performance

Tronox Holdings plc has received a Platinum Rating by EcoVadis in recognition of its sustainability efforts. The Platinum Rating puts Tronox in the top one percent of companies evaluated and represents a significant improvement over its Silver Rating in 2019 and 2020. The step change in Tronox’s 2021 EcoVadis rating reflects how deeply embedded sustainability and corporate social responsibility have become in its business practices and the advancements Tronox has made in its public disclosure on these topics. The EcoVadis assessment focuses on four themes: the environment, labor and human rights, ethics, and sustainable procurement. Tronox achieved a 10-point increase in all categories, and a 20-point increase in the environmental category. “In the past 18 months, we have taken a number of significant steps that demonstrate our commitment to sustainability, including publicly announcing our plan to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions and other environmental targets, aligning with Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) and Sustainable Accounting Standards Board (SASB) reporting, becoming a member of the UN Global Compact, and creating and implementing new compliance and environmental policies,” said Melissa Zona, Tronox’s Senior Vice President, External Affairs and Chief Sustainability Officer. “This accomplishment also reflects the importance of sustainability to our employees, who remain focused on operating our business responsibly for our customers, communities and future generations.”

Myanmar lays the foundations for sustainable forest management

“Third-party forest certificationMyanmar MFCS systems are critical actors to ensure Myanmar timber products are accepted by international markets”, said Mr Khin Mg Yi, Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Conservation (MONREC), at the launch of Myanmar’s third party timber certification system by the Myanmar Forest Certification Committee (MFCC). “Myanmar had a long established and successful history of forest and timber management and related laws. In parallel with democratically people-centred political, economic and social reform, Myanmar has been conducting forest sector reforms to conserve forest resources,” Mr Khin Mg Yi stressed. Click Read More below for additional information.

Two Sides Q3 Campaign Update 2020 Reports The Latest Campaign Successes

We are pleased to present the Two Sides Q3 Campaign Update 2020. Never has there been such widespread attention of the environmental credentials of the products and materials we use. A seismic shift is happening in both public and business attitudes towards sustainability. More people than ever appreciate that paper can be an environmentally sound choice for reading materials, communications, and packaging solutions. But, there is still a significant underestimation of just how sustainable paper and paper-based packaging is. It’s making our work at Two Sides more important than ever. Especially when we speak to consumers via our Love Paper campaign. The awareness of the Love Paper campaign is growing. We are continually seeing more visitors to our website (lovepaper.org). This year to date, we have had 15,000 website visitors, 30,000 website page views and gained over 2,500 social media followers.
Back To Top
×Close search
Search