Mass collections of aluminium cans planned for UAE
DUBAI // Half a billion drinks cans are sold in the Emirates each year, but just five per cent of them are recycled, far below the 63 per cent global recycling rate.
Emirates Environmental Group (EEG) has been working for more than a decade to try and drive home to consumers that cans should be diverted from landfills because they still have plenty of value even after they're empty.
Yesterday the group previewed its 14th annual aluminium can collection campaign, which will involve mass collections on February 24 and May 7 at 94 points throughout the country.
"There is a lot of value in that single can that is thrown away," said Habiba al Marashi, co-founder and chairperson of the EEG. "We do not look at aluminium cans as waste. They are a valuable raw material."
The Dubai-based Lucky Group, for example, is one company that is turning cans the EEG collects, as well as old window and door frames and car parts, into gleaming new bars of the metal.
Those are then sold on the international market to companies that produce cars, plane parts - even new beverage cans.
Aluminium, said Sabika Shaban, senior marketing coordinator at the company, is one of the easiest materials to recycle.
"Theoretically, it is hundred per cent recyclable," she said.
But the benefits of re-using aluminium go well beyond the commercial gain for recycling companies, said Mrs al Marashi.
In the UAE, recycling also helps conserve rapidly-vanishing landfill space - a key point in a country which generates so much waste.
Recycling aluminium also just makes sense in a world of rising levels of greenhouse gas emissions, where energy-saving is increasingly important.
About one per cent of global carbon dioxide emissions are attributed to aluminium production, said Mrs al Marashi. Extracting aluminium from bauxite rock is very energy-intensive, but recycling aluminium requires only five per cent of the energy needed to produce virgin material.
"It means recycling saves 95 per cent of otherwise required energy," she said.
The UAE has a long way to go to catch up to the rest of the world when it comes to recycling, but there is reason to be hopeful, said Mrs al Marashi.
"The society is becoming more aware, more committed and more proactive," she said.
The first can collection drive, in 1997, involved just a few participants. But last year's campaign brought in 23,000 kilogrammes of aluminium, 3,000 kg more than had been anticipated. This year's collection target is 23,000 kg - the highest ever.
"We are talking about millions of cans to be collected," said Mrs al Marashi.
Although not all locations have been confirmed, American International Academy in Abu Dhabi, Zabeel and Safa Parks in Dubai, the Radisson Blu Hotel in Sharjah and the premises of Fujairah Municipality are all participating.
All the cans will be processed at Lucky Group's factory in Jebel Ali. Salman Shaban, Lucky Group's commercial and marketing manager, said that although the plant already operates beyond its capacity, more aluminium could be processed, through greater efficiency, if waste were handled better.
"Locally, our main concern is that a good chunk [of aluminium waste] is ending up in landfills," he said.
Programmes encouraging households to segregate their waste can help the industry and the environment at the same time, he said.
"It makes life much easier for everybody, and more and more material can be recycled," said Mr Shaban.
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