JLR aims to use 75% recycled aluminium to make Jaguar and Land Rover vehicles by 2020

JLR is known to be mulling over an ambitious plan to start using 75 per cent recycled aluminium for making Jaguar and Land Rover vehicles from 2020 onward. Currently, less than half of aluminium volume used for making JLR vehicles comes from recycled sources. The shortfall is mainly attributed to a supply shortage. If JLR wants to increase the proportion of recycled aluminium it uses significantly it needs to find an alternative source of scrap aluminium.

The shortage is becoming more acute by the day as internal efficiency drives seek to reduce the volume of scrap metal produced at the press shops. According to Adrian Tautscher, group leader of sustainable aluminium strategies at JLR, "The limiting factor on the press shop scrap is how much scrap we generate. We are trying to reduce that all the time." He conceded that to push JLR's use of recycled aluminium closer to the 75 per cent mark, it will have to seek scrap supply from elsewhere.

According to the industry sources, the obvious answer to this is to start using recycled aluminium alloy straight from end-of-life vehicles, according to Andy Doran, senior manager for sustainability and recycling at Novelis. "If you want to increase that level of recycled aluminium, you can bring in open loop scrap... but ultimately end-of-life has got to be the driver for increasing recycling," he said.

However, the proposition of using old cars to manufacture new ones- no matter how easy it may sound is difficult to put into practice. While the first phase of JLR's REALCAR project focused on developing a high-quality recycled aluminium alloy, the second phase, launched in 2013, looked at how to source more scrap from post-consumer waste treatment centres.

Geoff Scamans, a Professor of Metallurgy at Brunel University who worked on the REALCAR 2 project, said while it was technically possible to turn post-consumer aluminium waste into the RC5754 alloy, the team had encountered "horrendous difficulty" during the sorting process. "We actually found that the separation technologies that we needed weren't available in the UK," he said.

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