The recycling rate for the aluminum cans reached 66.5% in 1997, representing a record 66.8 billion cans collected, according to figures just released by The Aluminum Assn., the Can Manufacturers Institute, and the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries. The 66.8 billion cans collected for recycling is an increase of 6.3% over the previous year.
By weight, the industry collected 2.05 billion pounds of aluminum in 1997, representing a 4.2% increase over the previous year. The number of cans manufactured from a pound of aluminum reached 32.57, an increase of 2.1% over the previous year. And recyclers received $1.03 billion for their used aluminum beverage cans last year.
According to The Aluminum Assn., the 54.7% recycled content rate for aluminum cans is the highest recycled content percentage of all packaging materials.
