Billion reasons to celebrate for SRI

United States – More than one billion tons of steel have been recycled by the North American steel industry since the Steel Recycling Institute (SRI) was established in 1988.

‘While recycling rates for steel products continue to increase, the most impressive figure is the overall steel recycling rate of 88%; this rate has exceeded 50% for more than a half century,’ says SRI. The organisation’s executive director Gregory L. Crawford adds: ‘For a quarter century, SRI has served as a driving force behind growing the availability of a key resource for steelmaking processes – steel scrap.’

In 2012, nearly 84 million tons of steel was recycled across North America. This total includes over 1.3 million tons of tinplate – ‘the equivalent of 21 billion steel cans’ – with a recycling rate of 72%, the highest among packaging materials.

Some 16.3 million tons of automotive scrap was recycled at a rate of 92.5% last year, which equates to 11.5 million vehicles. Recycling also accounted for some 2.7 million tons of appliance steel in 2012, for an estimated rate of 90%.

‘Also, each year, based on construction and demolition industry estimates, about 98% of out-of-service construction plates and beams are recycled and 70% of rebar and other structural steels are captured for recycling through demolition and disassembly,’ SRI notes.

For more information, visit: www.recycle-steel.org