What Happens to the Food and Drinks Cans I Recycle?

You can recycle food and drinks cans, and aerosols, at home through your kerbside recycling collection. Please rinse out your food and drinks cans and empty your aerosols before you put them in your recycling bin.

Food and drinks cans are either made out of steel or aluminium. The Materials Recycling Facility separates the different types of metal by using a magnet to attract the steel cans.  The aluminium cans are sorted from other types of recycling using an eddy current separator.

Recycling Aluminium Cans

Aluminium cans are firstly shredded to the size of a 10 pence piece. Shreds are passed through a magnetic drum system where any pieces of steel can be removed.  The covering on the cans is removed using a de-coating process.  This is achieved by blowing hot air, at a temperature of around 500°C through the shreds of aluminium as they are passed over a slow moving conveyor belt.  The shreds of aluminium cans are then fed into a furnace where they are melted down at temperatures of 700°C.  Any gases or contaminants are removed and the molten aluminium is then pumped into moulds and chilled with cool water until the metal solidifies.

Recycling Steel Cans

During the recycling process, cans are sent into a furnace where they are mixed with molten Iron.  Oxygen is blasted into the furnace, which is heated to a temperature around 1700°C.  The liquid metal is then poured into a mould to form large slabs.  These slabs are rolled into coils and it is these that are used to make new products such as a new bike, car, bridge, paperclip or even a new can.

Extracting raw materials, such as metals, from the earth is a very polluting process.  By recycling food and drinks cans, we reduce the need for raw materials and can help prevent this pollution.  And recycling cans saves energy too - recycling 1 tin can saves enough energy to power your television for 3 hours!