Industrial Ecology Programme and Department of Hydraulic and Environmental Engineering, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, SP Andersens vei 5, 7491 Trondheim, Norway.
Environ Sci Technol. 2011 Nov 15;45(22):9515-22. doi: 10.1021/es202211w. Epub 2011 Oct 20.
Global aluminum demand is anticipated to triple by 2050, by which time global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are advised to be cut 50-85% to avoid catastrophic climate impacts. To explore mitigation strategies systematically, a dynamic material flow model was developed to simulate the stocks and flows of the U.S. aluminum cycle and analyze the corresponding GHG emissions. Theoretical and realistic reduction potentials were identified and quantified. The total GHG emissions for the U.S. aluminum cycle in 2006 amount to 38 Mt CO(2)-equivalence. However, the U.S. has increasingly relied on imports of aluminum embodied in various products. The in-use stock is still growing fast in most product categories, which limits current scrap availability for recycling and emissions saving. Nevertheless, there is still large emission mitigation potential through recycling. The potentials from "100% old scrap collection" and "low emission energy" were each calculated to be higher than all process technology potential. Total emissions will decrease dramatically and mitigation priorities will change significantly under a stock saturation situation as much more old scrap becomes available for recycling. The nature of in-use stock development over the coming decades will be decisive for the aluminum industry to reach deeper emission cuts.
预计到 2050 年，全球铝需求将增长两倍，届时全球温室气体 (GHG) 排放量需减少 50-85%，以避免灾难性的气候影响。为了系统地探索缓解策略，开发了一个动态物质流模型来模拟美国铝循环的存量和流量，并分析相应的 GHG 排放。确定并量化了理论和实际的减排潜力。2006 年，美国铝循环的总 GHG 排放量达到 3800 万吨二氧化碳当量。然而，美国越来越依赖于各种产品中所含的进口铝。在大多数产品类别中，在用存量仍在快速增长，这限制了当前可用于回收和减排的废钢可用性。尽管如此，通过回收仍有很大的减排潜力。“100%旧废料回收”和“低排放能源”的潜力都被计算为高于所有工艺技术的潜力。在存量饱和的情况下，总排放量将大幅下降，缓解的优先事项将发生重大变化，因为将有更多的旧废料可用于回收。未来几十年在用存量的发展情况将对铝业实现更深层次的减排起着决定性的作用。
