Environmental Benefits of Salt Slag Processing
Landfilled Aluminium Salt Slag causes significant environmental problems through the release of ammonia into air and metals into groundwater. The avoidance of landfill results in the avoidance of these contamination issues.
The production of aluminium from Salt Slag waste, as compared to primary sources results in significantly reduced energy consumption. Metal recovered in this manner results in a 95% energy reduction when compared to aluminium produced from bauxite.
The Australian Aluminium Council states that primary aluminium production results in 3.1 tonnes of CO2 per tonne of metal. Aluminium recovered by Alreco from the Salt Slag uses 95% less energy to produce, and therefore reduces CO2 output by approximately 2.945 tonnes of CO2 per tonne of metal.
The Australian Aluminium Industry has been promoting the ‘Green Can’ concept – an infinitely recyclable product with no resultant waste. This is only achievable due to the technology being implemented by Alreco.
Alreco is looking to implement an evaporation plant into the circuit, that will produce a crystalline salt from the Salt Slag treatment and recover the evaporated water. This will result in the saving of approximately 120,000,000 litres of water per year for reuse in the process.
