Information from the British Metal Recycling

Association (BMRA) website

Metal recycling is a £4.5billion UK industry, processing

ferrous and non ferrous metal scrap into vital secondary raw
material for the smelting of new metals. The industry employs
over 8,000 people and makes a net contribution to UK balance
of trade. Worldwide, over 400 million tones of metal is
recycled each year.

Virtually all metals can be recycled into high quality

new metal. The process varies for different metals, but
generally produces metals of equivalent quality.

Metal recycling protects the environment and saves

energy. Using secondary raw materials means less use of
natural resources which would otherwise be needed to make
new metal compounds – such as iron ore in steelmaking; nickel
in stainless steel; or alumina and bauxite in aluminium
smelting. There are also considerable savings in energy, and
reduced CO2 emissions, in production methods using recycled
materials:

EU figures indicate that using recycled raw materials, including

metals, cuts CO2 emissions by some 200 million tones every
year.

There are also other environmental benefits, for example,

using recycled steel to make new steel enables reductions
such as:

• 86% in air pollution

• 40% in water use
• 76% in water pollution

Answer the following questions in your book:

1. What are the main environmental advantages to

using recycled metal?
2. In the future, do you think there will be an
increase or a decrease in the amount of metal
recycling? Why?
3. What metals do you recycle at home? What metals
don’t you recycle at home?
4. What do you think about the facilities available in
your area for the recycling of metals?